魔王(シューベルト)
German ballad-poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe depicting a father desperately riding with his sick son through a forest while being assailed by a (possibly imaginary) supernatural fae creature.

Originally written in 1782 as part of the Singpiel (folk opera play, roughly) [i]Die Fischerin[/i],  [i]Erlkönig[/i] is widely considered Goethe's most famous work. It is often a required reading in German schools, as well as in advanced German classes for people taking German as a second language. 

The ballad has also been set to music by many different famous composers, with Franz Schubert's version (composed in 1815) being most prominent. Several illustrations of [i]Erlkönig[/i] also exist; these tend to depict the father riding desperately while clutching his son, with the titular Erlkönig ("Elf King") levitating in hot pursuit. 

[i]Erlkönig[/i] is known as 魔王 ("Maou", Demon King) in Japanese. Authorship in Japanese sources is sometimes misattributed to Schubert. 

h4. External links

* "German Wikisource: Erlkönig":[https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Erlk%C3%B6nig] [tn]Original German verses[/tn]
* "Wikisource: The Alder King":[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Alder_King] [tn]English  translation by Edgar Alfred Bowring[/tn]
* "Youtube: Franz Schubert's Erlkönig / The Elf King":[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcmP5RNB4P0] [tn]Fan splice of a singing performance set to a German comic depicting the events of Erlkönig, with English subtitles[/tn]
erlkoenig