HEINRICH HEINE - Repositories

I^etne, 99
HEINE'S FAME AS A POET.
No, I will not feign a hypocritical
humility, I will not depreciate that
name. It is much to be a poet, especially
to be a great lyric poet, in Germany,
among a people who in two
things —in philosophy and in poetry —
have surpassed all other nations. I
will not with a sham modesty — the invention
of worthless vagabonds — depreciate
my fame as a poet. None of
my countrymen have won the laurel at
80 early an age; and if my colleague,
Wolfgang Goethe, complacently writes
that "the Chinese with trembling hand
paints Werther and Lotte on porcelain,"
I can, if boasting is to be in order,
match his Chinese fame with one still
more legendary, for I have recently
learned that my poems have been translated
into the Japanese language.
CONTEMPLATION VERSUS IMITATION.
Francesca da PolenH and her handsome
fnend paid dearly for reading together
such a book; - the greater danger,
it is true, lay in the fact that thev
suddenly stopped reading.