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I encountered the expression "an old Weihnachten world that went under", but am struggling to understand it. Could you please let me know what it means? Here is the excerpt:
If I were a better son, I’d do what the father of that dying princess promised he’d do for his daughter each year. I’d bring out his old bones so that he might feel the winter sun again and shiver at the thought of good mulled wines and thick, warm butternut soups sprinkled with diced chestnuts, bring out his body to savor the elegy of moonlit snow as he dreams of an old Weihnachten world that went under and of a love that addled before its time. It didn’t addle, it never happened, he used to say, and for all he knew, the other woman never knew she was the light of his one short, unfinished life—a love most chaste, a love most chaste, Your mother never knew either, and no point telling her now.
- André Aciman, Eight White Nights, Eight Night
This is a novel published in the United States of America in 2010. This novel is narrated by the nameless male protagonist. The protagonist meets Clara at a Christmas party in Manhattan. Now, the protagonist is thinking what he would do for his late father had he been a better son.
In this part, I wonder what the underlined expression means.
I learned in the dictionary that "Weihnachten" means "Christmas" in German, but as for the "went under" part, I have absolutely no clue, unless that is a sunken, underwater world...
So I just wanted to ask you.
If I were a better son, I’d do what the father of that dying princess promised he’d do for his daughter each year. I’d bring out his old bones so that he might feel the winter sun again and shiver at the thought of good mulled wines and thick, warm butternut soups sprinkled with diced chestnuts, bring out his body to savor the elegy of moonlit snow as he dreams of an old Weihnachten world that went under and of a love that addled before its time. It didn’t addle, it never happened, he used to say, and for all he knew, the other woman never knew she was the light of his one short, unfinished life—a love most chaste, a love most chaste, Your mother never knew either, and no point telling her now.
- André Aciman, Eight White Nights, Eight Night
This is a novel published in the United States of America in 2010. This novel is narrated by the nameless male protagonist. The protagonist meets Clara at a Christmas party in Manhattan. Now, the protagonist is thinking what he would do for his late father had he been a better son.
In this part, I wonder what the underlined expression means.
I learned in the dictionary that "Weihnachten" means "Christmas" in German, but as for the "went under" part, I have absolutely no clue, unless that is a sunken, underwater world...