Page:Masterpieces of German literature volume 7.djvu/190

 156 woman in modern German literary history. Immermann fell in love with Countess Elisa von Luetzow-Ahlefeldt, wife of the famous old commander of volunteers, Brigadier-General von Luetzow. Elisa, an extremely gifted and spirited woman, had formed a circle of interesting people, in which her husband, a dashing soldier but a man of uninteresting mentality, played a very subordinate part. Immermann and Elisa struggled along against the tyranny of the affinity that drew them together. Immermann wrote a number of dramas, highly romantic, in which the passion and strife within him found varied expression. The play which made him known beyond his immediate circle, was Cardenio und Celinde, the conflict of which was suggested by his own.

Elisa was finally divorced from Luetzow. Immermann was appointed a judge in Magdeburg, and later in Duesseldorf. He asked Elisa to marry him. She refused, but offered to live with him in free companionship. They joined their lives, pledging themselves not to enter other relations. They remained together until 1839, less than a year before Immermann's death, when he married a young girl of nineteen. Elisa left his house in sorrow and bitterness. Immermann characterized his relation to her thus in a letter to his fiancee, in 1839: "I loved the countess deeply and purely when I was kindled by her flame. But she took such a strange position toward me that I never could have a pure, genuine, enduring joy in this love. There were delights, but no quiet gladness. I always felt as if a splendid comet had appeared on the horizon, but never as if the dear warm God's sun had risen."

His life with Elisa in Duesseldorf was rich in friends and works. The sculptor Schadow, the founder of the art school there, the dramatists von Uechtritz and Michael Beer, brother of Meyerbeer, were among his friends. He had intimate relations with Mendelssohn during the years of the latter 's stay in Duesseldorf. He tried to assist Grabbe, the erratic and unfortunate dramatist. During three years he was manager of the Duesseldorf theatre,