THE MODERN POLISH FRONTIERS 395university took second place only to Berlin, produced name after name of inter-
national distinction. In the realm of the arts, too, the prominence of Germany's
former eastern province is self-evident. From the Teutonic castles of
Marienburg (Malbork) and Neidenburg (Nidizica), and the Gothic spires of
Stettin's Fieterkirche and Danzig's Marienkirche, to the Renaissance curiosities
of Hirschberg (Jelenia Gora), Bad Landeck (Ladek Zdoj), or Neisse (Nysa), the
florid Baroque of Grussau (Krzeszow) and Leubus (tubiaz), and the tasteless
ostentation of countless Wilhelmian public buildings, Poland's Recovered
Territories are filled with architectural items which belong to the corpus of
German, not of Polish, expression. The older theatres, concert halls, and gal-
leries of Breslau, Posen, Stettin, and Danzig belong to the world of German, not
Polish, culture.
Above all, in the realm of German literature, the contribution of the eastern-
ers was of paramount importance. As early as the thirteenth century, the court
of Heinrich V, Prince of Silesia (1266-90), reputedly flourished as a resort of the
Minnesingers. In the era of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, the
Protestant Johannes Scheffler (1624—77), known as 'Angelus Silesius' (The
Silesian Angel), wrote hymns and devotional works learned by German
Christians of every denomination. The literary reforms of the seventeenth cen-
tury were initiated by Martin Opitz von Boberfeld (1597—1639) of Bunzlau
(Bolestawiec), developed by Friedrich von Logau (1604-55) and Christian
Hoffmann (1618-79), both officials of the Silesian court, and perfected by
Andreas Gryphius (1616-64) of Fraustadt (Wschowa). The Revival of the eigh-
teenth century was finely represented by the work of von Kleist, whose poem
Der Frubling (Spring) must appear in almost every volume of collected German
verse. The growth of the Romantic Movement was greatly enhanced by
E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776-1822), whose fantastic Tales were first conceived dur-
ing the boredom of his duties as an official of South Prussia in Plock, and then
in Warsaw. The earnest realities of middle-class life in Breslau were exactly
reconstructed by Gustav Freytag (1816-95), whose Soll und Haben (Debit and
Credit, 1855) has been rated the archetypal German novel of the century. Similar
acclaim was to be won at a later date by Arnold Zweig (1887-1968) of Glogau
(Gtogow) for Der Streit um den Sergeanten Grischa (The Dispute about
Sergeant Grischa, 1927). But the real prowess of the Silesian school was to be
found in the lyric poetry of Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff (1788-1857), who
was born at Lubowitz (Lubomia) and died at Neisse, and of Gerhart
Hauptmann (1862-1946) who lived at Agnetendorf (Jagniatkow) in the
Reisengebirge. Eichendorff's simple melodic lines, evoking gaunt hills, dark
forests, and moonlit nights, frequently provided the inspiration for songs by
Schubert, Schumann, and Wolf. His chosen themes of Lust (Nostalgia), Heimat
(The Homeland), and Waldeinsamkeit (Loneliness-in-the-Forest) excited the
same poignant sentiments for German expellees of the post-war generation as
for his contemporaries. Here, if anywhere, is the banished soul of German
Silesia: