German word of the day: Liebestoll

With Valentine’s Day around the corner on Friday, today’s word of the day is a good one for all of the Love Birds looking for a way to sum up their flowery feelings.

Published: Wed 12 Feb 2020 10:28 CEST
German word of the day: Liebestoll

This word is easily recognized by anyone in the initial (or, if you’re lucky, later) stages of love, when you feel utterly and completely head-over-heels in love with someone.

In English, the best translations would be love-struck, lovelorn or moonstruck.

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This is the feeling that Germany’s Dichter und Denker (poets and thinkers) have had throughout the ages, when they have composed poetic homages expressing their limitless Liebe - sometimes with somberness when it comes to love not returned.

Eighteenth-century Germany writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was liebestoll himself when he penned a novel, inspired by his own feelings, about unrequited love in the 1770s.

The Sorrows of Young Werther focuses on a young artist who falls madly in love with a beautiful young woman he meets, before learning that she is engaged to another man.

A dramatic turn of events ensues, and Werther - so overcome with emotion - takes a tragic decision to stop the suffering he sees imposed by Charlotte.

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The intense emotion expressed in the novel made it one of the most important works in Germany’s Sturm and Drang (Storm and Urge) literary movement.

The movement broke free from a period of rationalism in literature and philosophy that had followed the Enlightenment, and instead centred on extremes of emotion and individual subjectivity - or in Goethe’s case, an individual’s lovelorn state dominating their view of the world.

In summary, whether you’re simply feeling super happy with your significant other, or in a suffer-less state of all-consuming feelings for the person you yearn for but cannot have, liebestoll is a strong word to express the perhaps inexpressible emotion of love.

 

The official trailer for the 2010 German film 'Young Goethe in Love', a historical drama film inspired by the events that led Goethe to pen his 'The Sorrows of a Young Werther.'

Examples:

Der liebestolle Werther könnte nicht ohne Charlotte leben.

The lovestruck Werther couldn’t live without Charlotte.

Romeo und Julia waren jung und liebestoll.

Romeo and Juliet were young and lovestruck.

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