A Poem by Theodor Storm: Geh nicht hinein

Abstract

This article discusses Theodor Storm's late poem Geh nicht hinein (1879) and places it in the context of Storm's œuvre and especially of a group of his poems devoted to the subject of human transience, memory, and death. It also examines Storm's contemporaries' treatment of similar subject matter. In the unruliness of its expression and the uncompromising finality of its message, this poem on the death of a sixteen-year-old boy stands out as Storm's starkest statement on the problems of human mortality.