This chapbook presents not only a variety of moods and colours in Heine's poems about the North Sea but also a loose narrative which takes us from the shore, to scenes aboard ship, and the return to harbour, ending with a pastoral scene in which the sea has been truly left behind. Written in free verse rather than the rhymed quatrains Heine usually used, these poems explore the intersections between myth and everyday life in vivid scenes which mirror the fluid motions and moods of the sea.

A poet whose verse inspired music by Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn and Brahms, Heinrich Heine (1797-1856) was in his lifetime equally admired for his elegant prose. This collection charts the development of that prose, beginning with three meditative works from the Travel Pictures, inspired by Heine's journeys as a young man to Lucca, Venice and the Harz Mountains. Exploring the development of spirituality, the later On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany spans the earliest religious beliefs of the Germanic people to the philosophy of Hegel, and warns with startling force of the dangers of yielding to 'primeval Germanic paganism'. Finally, the Memoirs consider Heine's Jewish heritage and describe his early childhood. As rich in humour, satire, lyricism and anger as his greatest poems, together the pieces offer a fascinating insight into a brilliant and prophetic mind.