It's title, Erlkönig (literally: Alderking) was later used as a term for camouflaged prototypes of new automobiles, which, still in development, were being secretively tested of the streets, and of which one could catch a fleeting glance or make a blurry photograph of, only to have people doubt what you saw.
The defining line, "And if you are not willing, I shall employ force!" was cited by generations of Germans wresting with uncooperative artifacts (and people).
It is a short ballad about a father desperately trying to reach home on a horse through a forest in the dead of night, holding his fevering, deliriously moaning and dying young boy under his cloak (note the steady escalation of both coercion and violence).
Here's what every German used to know by heart (and ridicule):
The Ballad of Alderking
(Or, if you will, the King of Elves)
By Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749-1832
Who's riding, so late, through the wind and night?
It is the father, bearing his child.
He's holding the youngster well in his arm,
He is holding him tightly, he is keeping him warm.
My son, why do you so cower in fear?
Don't you, my father, see Alderking there?
The Alderking, with crown and with veil?
My son, that's just a foggy trail.
"Oh, lovely child, come hither with me!
Wonderful games I will play with thee.
Such pretty flowers we will find on the shore,
My mother will offer you clothing of gold."
My father, my father, do you not hear
What Alderking silently promises me?
Be still, my child, stay calm, those have been
Some barren dry leaves rustling in the wind.
"My strapping young lad, won't you go with me?
My daughters will certainly serve you with glee.
My daughters, they lead in the nightly reign,
They will sing and dance, and cradle you fine."
My father, my father, do you not see
The Alderking's daughters, there, waiting for me?
My son, my son, I will truthfully say:
Some old pollard willows are shimmering grey!
"I love you, my child, your beauty tempts me,
And if you're not willing, I'll violate thee!"
My father, my father, he is touching me now,
The Alderking has done me some woe.
The father is frightened, he rides as if wild,
He holds in his arms the suffering child.
He reaches the homestead with faltering stride
To find, in his arms, that the child, it has died.
There are quite a few plains of interpretation here
- The translation of spooky surroundings into real dread (on the side of the father) and death (of the child)
- The steady escalation of coercion and violence by a third party as experienced by the (pre- pubescent) boy; first he is called "lovely" and offered interesting games, then pretty flowers, then golden clothes (invoking the King's mother, no less!); next he is called a "lad" (orig. "Knabe") and offered the nocturnal company of daughters; not accepting the offers, and instead turning to his father for help, he is finally called "beautiful in body" (orig. "schöne Gestalt") and "tempting", then violated and killed by the enraged and scorned Alderking.
Of course, I do not know if this escalation in pubescence was intentional, but it certainly is conspicuous and striking (Goethe being Goethe, I even suppose it was).
- The rising panic, helplessness, and loss of control of the situation on the side of the father, who either has no clue what is going on, or indeed does, but has no choice but to carry on, only to lose his child to forces stronger than himself.
Going back to the poem, note that we do not learn why the two are away from home, and what happened before; perhaps the child was sick and they had visited a doctor, or the child was previously healthy and became sick away from home, or perhaps the trip itself is killing it, despite all attempts of the father to "keep him safe and warm".
Some say that the child is dying because of the terror of his hallucinations; or that the boy sees the Alderking on account of his fever and then dies of it, unrelated; but to go further, as a non- German acquaintance of mine did, and say: "because he is already dying" - that's stark.
First the promises of beauty, then of companionship, then the threat of violation and its execution in the form of the touch and kiss of death in all it's inevitability.
The boy does not die because he sees the Alderking, he sees the Alderking because he is dying.
Here is a musical interpretetation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tD3HuFGgv8
Achim Reichel - Der Erlkönig (Live in Hamburg, 2003)
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