When Schumann wrote the song collection Gedichte der Königin Maria Stuart (Mary Stuart Songs; 1852), his last work for solo voice, the composer's health was in decline, he was suffering from deep depression, and his continuing struggle with the management of the Dusseldorf Orchestra resulted in his being asked to resign his post as conductor. While Schumann's letters and diary are somewhat disjointed and unclear on the subject, he must have identified strongly with the protagonist of these poems, Mary, Queen of Scots. While many composers have made musical use of Mary's story, and the best-known of such efforts (such as Giacomo Carissimi's Lamento della Regina Maria Stuarda or Gaetano Donizetti's 1834 opera Maria Stuarda) treat her as a persecuted and largely innocent heroine, Schumann's probable sense of a shared plight of unjust oppression and doom make this music some of the most poignant on the subject of Mary.

The texts, attributed to Mary herself, were translated into German and versified by Gisbert Vincke. Each song is in a minor key, the first and last two in E minor and the third, "An die Königen Elisabeth," in A minor. The pervasive minor feeling and the generally slow, even funereal tempi make the mood of impending tragedy unrelenting. The one change to a different key (still minor) is clearly an only temporary and still-nervous possibility of hope, soon to be revert to the fear and gentle resignation of the other songs. Even Mary's prayer at the birth of her son, "Nach der Geburt ihres Sohnes," is subdued rather than joyous, with a sparse accompaniment and a hushed vocal line that barely spans an octave. There is little theater here; the songs are instead explorations of Mary's psyche and emotions.

In the final, troubled years of Schumann's career, the composer's style became increasingly spare, even minimalistic, and these songs aptly reflect this tendency. It would not be too farfetched to say that the almost completely unrelieved sorrow and sense of misery in these settings, which certainly could have encompassed a wider range of emotions, express the bleak depression that continued to plague the composer until his death four years later.

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