Eugène Delacroix
Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel / Marguerite au rouet
Illustration for Goethe’s “Faust I”
1828
Lithograph
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett
Gretchen has fallen in love with Faust after he courted her intensely and they kissed for the first time. But she senses that this love will not end happily. So she talks to herself in her room, a monologue that was also set to music by Franz Schubert (1797–1828) in 1814.
The refrain goes:
My peace is gone
my heart is heavy
I find, I find it no more