HEINRICH HEINE - Repositories

Heinrich Heine
his relationship to Salomon Heine, the Hamburg
banker and businessman who had supplied him
with a rather impressive letter-of-credit for this
trip. At any rate, English men-of-letters remained
unmindful of him. From his arrival in April to his
departure in August, his reports to his friends in
Germany were filled with complaints about his
loneliness and about his complete lack of contact
with Englishmen of intellect or spirit. His disappointment
with the English cropped out in the articles
written soon after his return to the Continent
and in his oft-quoted caustic comments on
English ways and characteristics.
The first reactions of the English press did not
take the form of a rebuttal of Heine's unjustified
attacks. On the contrary, the Athenaeum, goodnaturedly,
reprinted on September 10, 1828,
Heine's article on London — the finest of the entire
series of English Fragments, and many a reader
must have pondered on the insight of the talented
foreigner, who ferreted out both the strength and
the weakness of the hustling, bustling metropolis.
The Athenaeum retained a friendly attitude
towards Heine throughout the difficult years when
he was battling his way to fame and when it seemed
as though his hand were against every man and
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