ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses a song whose chromaticism, rippling accompaniment, and grand scope recall both "Die Gebusche" and "Nachthymne": Schubert's sweeping setting of Schlegel's nature poem "Im Walde". "Im Walde", composed in December 1820, is thus linked with the first Abendrote setting, composed in January 1819, and the last Novalis setting, composed in January 1820. Some of the poem's images and references evoke themes of German nationalism, and this would have been clear to informed readers, but others can be explained only through knowledge of philosophical ideas that Schlegel had expounded in private lectures many years before Schubert encountered Abendrote poems. In place of the poem's metaphysical narrative, Stark substituted a Mendelssohnian fairy story. The poem "Im Walde" calls on many images that were potent for German nationalists: the forest, a powerful thunderstorm, the poignant force of memory, and the association of outdoor experiences with natural piety.
