Strip
26
February 8, 2009
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Faust
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Today's strip will most probably be understood be very few people, but it fit very well to this day. In fact I got the idea just yesterday. Tomorrow I have a German test about Wolfgang Goethe's Faust, one of the greatest German literature works (at least that's what they say). I won't go into the details but in short: He seems to have problems deciding whether he's in a good mood or not, and also tries to kill himself. And our student here seems to have such problems too and being in fear of little Gretchen's fate. In the play Faust doesn't manage to kill himself because he hears the children's choir at Easter which reminds him of his childhood and gives him back his will to live. I didn't use an Eastersong but something you could hear here in Luxembourg last Monday, February 2nd. It was "Liichtmëssdag"! Or Candlemas as it is in English. Following the tradition children go from house to house with lampions and sing a song like "Léiwer Härgottsblieschen" to get sweets. A bit similar to Halloween, just in a civilized way. The first three verses I used mean: Dear "Härgottsblieschen", give us bacon and peas One pound, two pounds The funniest part comes when they sing that the young people should live and the older ones die. At some day someone decided that singing this when you want sweets from older neighbours isn't that much of a good idea. So it was changed to let them live beside the younger people (changed from "stierwen" to "derniewend"). It's always nice to remember such things, it was really fun. And lucrative. Especially if you don't go to church as it is supposed to be and like everybody does and instead loot the village with a friend before the others can even start. Children can be so nasty, and clever. Oh, and if you're wondering what the hell a poodle is doing there: Read Faust. |