ABSTRACT
A word on the Heym poems that follow: “With the Ships of Passage” (found among Heym’s posthumous notes) was written in two versions, both appearing here in German. The first version is an uninteresting imitation of George’s long, unenjambed lines, slow and stately. The second draft has quick, short enjambed lines (though with identical meaning and diction) in an original rhythm later imitated by Gottfried Benn. In this way, a few weeks before drowning, Heym created his own style and perhaps became an even greater poet than George. In a private letter of January 15, 1951, Benn called “With the Ships” “the most beautiful poem of the twentieth century.”
