Question
By the sea, by the desolate nocturnal sea,Stands a youthful man,His breast full of sadness, his head full of doubt.And with bitter lips he questions the waves:"Oh solve me the riddle of life!The cruel, world-old riddle,Concerning which, already many a head hath been racked.Heads in hieroglyphic-hats,Heads in turbans and in black caps,Periwigged heads, and a thousand otherPoor, sweating human heads.Tell me, what signifies man?Whence does he come? whither does he go?Who dwells yonder above the golden stars?"
The waves murmur their eternal murmur,The winds blow, the clouds flow past.Cold and indifferent twinkle the stars,And a fool awaits an answer.
Words in this poem
- sadness n.
- Heaviness; firmness.
- whither adv.
- To what place; -- used interrogatively; as, whither goest thou [OE. whider. AS. hwider; akin to E. where, who; cf. Goth. hvadre whither. See Who, and cf. Hither, Thither.]
- yonder adv.
- At a distance, but within view. [OE. yonder, ýonder; cf. OD. ginder, Goth. jaindr there. Yond, adv.]
- twinkle v. i.
- To open and shut the eye rapidly; to blink; to wink. [OE. twinklen, AS. twinclian; akin to OE. twinken to blink, wink, G. zwinken, zwinkern, and perhaps to E. twitch.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Question is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems and Ballads, Project Gutenberg ebook #31726, the Emma Lazarus translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Heinrich Heine, Question, in Poems and Ballads (1881), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #31726, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/heine-poems-ballads/question.html, id L15466.
Form and metre
Question is 18 lines in 2 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.7 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 6% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 -A---------A-- sea · manA · doubt · waves · life · riddle · racked · hats · caps · other · heads · manA · go · stars
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| By the sea, by the desolate nocturnal sea, | 11 | ·····/˘˘/˘· |
| Stands a youthful man, | 5 | ··/˘· |
| His breast full of sadness, his head full of doubt. | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| And with bitter lips he questions the waves: | 10 | ··/˘··/˘·· |
| "Oh solve me the riddle of life! | 8 | ····/˘·· |
| The cruel, world-old riddle, | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Concerning which, already many a head hath been racked. | 13 | ˘/˘·˘/˘/····· |
| Heads in hieroglyphic-hats, | 7 | ···˘/˘· |
| Heads in turbans and in black caps, | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| Periwigged heads, and a thousand other | 10 | ······/˘/˘ |
| Poor, sweating human heads. | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| Tell me, what signifies man? | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| Whence does he come? whither does he go? | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| Who dwells yonder above the golden stars?" | 10 | ··/˘···/˘· |
| The waves murmur their eternal murmur, | 10 | ··/˘·˘/˘/˘ |
| The winds blow, the clouds flow past. | 7 | ······· |
| Cold and indifferent twinkle the stars, | 9 | ··˘/˘/˘·· |
| And a fool awaits an answer. | 8 | ···˘/·/˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.