for example, the history professor Arndt and above all his grand lecture on the patriotic significance of the appearance of Goethe’s Faust in the period of Napoleonic foreign rule. I would like to commemorate the author Hans von Wolzogen, who familiarized us with Richard Wagner’s role as a great herald of German character. I would like to commemorate the old war-disabled fighter Fedor von Köppen, singer and hero all at once, who captivated us young people with the rhetorical energy and honest pathos of his patriotic poetry, and who, as an official speaker, was also an enthusiastic herald of the German idea. At the same time, he was also the most indefatigable and cheerful of drinking buddies – one with whom no one else could easily keep up. But the V. D. St. was more than speeches and parties. If it wished to make a legitimate claim to the leadership of the national student body, then it had to incorporate action. The committee elections for the academic Reading Hall provided it with an opportunity in this respect. The direction in which the Reading Hall was led and the intellectual materials available there had considerable power to influence the student body’s position on national issues; powerful currents of influence emanated from it and into the souls of the students. As a result, it was here that opinions diverged most clearly, and a bitter struggle ensued over this position, whose maintenance both sides regarded as a matter of decisive significance. This struggle, which saw the quickest wits from both sides face off at the scene, was followed with feverish tension and expectation. Let me mention our champions here: in Hoeres and Rosenhagen we had distinguished, prudent, and skilful leaders; at their side stood the aforementioned Burkhardt and Troebst, with their sharp rhetorical swords. Even in those days, unless my memory deceives me, Baron von Zedlitz stood out. On April 1, 1885, Bismarck’s 70th birthday, I met him once again during that eternally memorable morning pint at the Reich Chancellor’s, where I judged him to be one of the best speakers of our great common students’ deputation of all universities. Another remarkable personality was the Alsatian Schweitzer, who had already waved the still much-disputed flag of Germandom among the students of his home university in Strasbourg before going to Leipzig, where, with his vigorous speeches at important academic events, he served as living proof of old Germandom in the reclaimed borderland. And how much cheering erupted on November 12, 1882, when we won a glorious victory over the opposing side, which was led mainly by Jews, and when our representatives Walter Burkhardt and Bauer were elected to the committee. From the victory celebration subsequently organized by the V. D. St., I have kept in my files a poem* written specifically for the occasion. It may be a bit coarse for my current liking, but it provides such a fresh introduction to the events back then, and to the atmosphere they generated, that it ought to be shared on this occasion.
* See next page
Source: Dr. R.P. Oßwald, “Hundert Semester Verein Deutscher Studenten zu Leipzig” [“One Hundred Semesters of the Association of German Students in Leipzig”], in DStv! 50 Jahre Verein Deutscher Studenten zu Leipzig 1881-1931 [German Students’ Association! 50 Years of the Association of German Students in Leipzig 1881-1931]. Leipzig: Verlag des A.H.-Bundes des V. Dt. St. Leipzig e.V., n.d. [cc. 1931], pp. 3-13.
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