The Wreck of the Deutschland explained
The Wreck of the Deutschland is a 35-stanza ode by Gerard Manley Hopkins with Christian themes, composed in 1875 and 1876, though not published until 1918.[1] [2] The poem depicts the shipwreck of the SS Deutschland. Among those killed in the shipwreck were five Franciscan nuns forced to leave Germany by the Falk Laws; the poem is dedicated to their memory.
The poem has attracted considerable critical attention,[3] and is often considered Hopkins' masterpiece because of its length, ambition, and use of sprung rhythm and instress.
Popular culture
- Hopkins's struggles while writing the poem form the basis for the Ron Hansen novel Exiles.[4]
- The poem plays a major role in Anthony Burgess' third "Enderby" novel, The Clockwork Testament, or Enderby's End, in which Enderby pitches an idea for a movie adaptation of the poem and produces a script, but the resulting movie bears little resemblance to either his script or to Hopkins's poem.[5]
- Both Hopkins's efforts to write the poem and the real-life events on the Deutschland are the subject of Simon Edge's novel The Hopkins Conundrum.[6]
- The first several lines of the ode are part of a relief sculpture above the door inside the Palace of Nations, the home of the United Nations Office at Geneva.[7]
External links
- - includes audiobook recording of the complete poem
Notes and References
- http://rpo.library.utoronto.ca/poems/wreck-deutschland-dec-6-7-1875 Online text and basic information
- Rizq . Michael . 2022-05-12 . ‘Bidding and forbidding’: Morality, Prosody, and The Wreck of the Deutschland . The Review of English Studies . 10.1093/res/hgac004 . 0034-6551.
- Readings of the Wreck. Ed. Peter Milward and Raymond Schoder. Chicago: University of Loyola Press, 1976.
- Web site: Exiles . . 11 October 2023 . en . 20 May 2008.
- Web site: O'Hara . J. D. . The Clockwork Testament or Enderby's End . The New York Times . 11 October 2023 . 2 February 1975.
- Web site: Simon Edge describes 19th century shipwreck that inspired latest novel. 8 May 2017.
- Web site: Inside the Palais des Nations - Richard Flynn.