Composed in November 1822, the Wandererfantasie is, despite the high technical hurdles set by the composer, far from a virtuoso work in the sense of an artistic showpiece. Nor would it be true to Schubert if it were. It is a freely sketched fantasy, but it is also a consciously organized sonata, without being through-composed in every detail, with homogeneous transitions between the individual movements. The Wandererfantasie is an exaltation and an apotheosis of the wandering life. The subsequently applied programmatic title alludes to a quotation from Schubert's own early song Der Wanderer in the Adagio of the work. Schubert originally saw the text of the song as Der Flüchtling (the fugitive). It may not be the greatest poetry, but it had an immediate impact on Schubert, because its author Schmidt of Lübeck (Georg Philipp Schmidt) addressed the composer's own deepest feelings. Identifying himself with the lyrical subject of the Wanderer, the poet challenges Schubert to the same act of identification. The passage "The sun seems to me here so cold, the blossom faded, life grown old, and what they talk is empty air, I am a stranger everywhere" is set by Schubert to a dactylic rhythm (dah-de-de), setting the Wanderer rhythm. It is one of Schubert's basic rhythms, fraught with the symbols of moving on, of departure, of death.