August Wilhelm Iffland

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August Wilhelm Iffland, lithograph by Johann Stephan Decker , around 1820.

Iffland's signature:
Signature August Wilhelm Iffland (cropped) .jpg

August Wilhelm Iffland (born April 19, 1759 in Hanover , † September 22, 1814 in Berlin ) was a German actor , director and playwright .

Life

Iffland as purging sack and Franz Labes as arrow in Molière's " The Miser ", Act I, 3rd appearance, lithograph by Friedrich Weise after a Berlin performance around 1810

August Wilhelm Iffland was born in Hanover in the Leibnizhaus as the son of the registrar at the Royal War Chancellery Johann Rudolf Iffland (1714–1775) and his wife Carolina Schröder (1725–1779). At the local lyceum he was a classmate of Karl Philipp Moritz , who described the encounter in his autobiographical novel Anton Reiser . Iffland was determined by his respected parents for the study of theology, but escaped in 1777 secretly to Gotha , where he became a member of the Court Theater and Friedrich Wilhelm gods a friendly guide as well as in Conrad Ekhof , Heinrich Beck (at baptism his daughter Luise Beck he Godfather) and Johann David Beil found role models.

August Wilhelm Iffland as Bittermann
Johann Gottfried Schadow : Portrait bust of August Wilhelm Iffland (1807)

In 1779, when most of the actors who had left Gotha, were won over by Elector Karl Theodor for the Mannheim stage , Iffland soon made a name for himself here and through guest performances. He developed into a character actor who placed the psychological-realistic art of acting at the center of his work.

He experienced a triumph in 1782 as Franz Moor in the first performance of Friedrich Schiller's play Die Räuber . "Germany will still find a master in this young man," said Schiller, praising his performance. In Mannheim there was a close cooperation between the two.

In 1786, Prince Ludwig von Nassau-Saarbrücken invited Iffland to his Saarbrücken residence. The chronically indebted actor accepted the invitation. He appeared repeatedly at the Princely Court and staged a few plays. He also wrote plays such as Der Einsiedler and Luassan for his financier . After the French revolutionary troops marched into Saarbrücken (1793) and the associated destruction of the comedy house built by Balthasar Wilhelm Stengel , Iffland ended its activities on the Saar.

August Wilhelm Iffland as Sophir

Iffland has made guest appearances on all major stages in German-speaking countries. In April 1796 he stayed in Weimar at the invitation of Goethe . Karl August Böttiger described every role played by Iffland during this stay in a monograph. Further guest stays in Weimar followed in 1798, 1810 and 1812. During his stay in 1796, Goethe wrote the following distich in Iffland's family record:

“A lot is always said about the arts and artists in Germany;
We have now looked at artists and the arts at the same time. "

Goethe held Iffland in high regard as an actor. Iffland served him as a role model in shaping the Weimar ensemble and his acting style. In the essay “Weimar Court Theater. 1802 ”, Goethe describes the knowledge he had gained through Iffland's play:“ The appearance of Iffland in our theater finally solved the riddle. The wisdom with which this excellent artist separates his roles from one another, knows how to make each one a whole and knows how to mask himself in both the noble and the common, and always artistic and beautiful, was too eminent to be unproductive should be ". In the play Ifflands Goethe recognized that the art of acting is an autonomous art.

The events of the war prompted Iffland in 1796 to follow a call to Berlin as director of the national theater there on the Gendarmenmarkt. Iffland came to Berlin for a guest performance in October at the invitation of King Friedrich Wilhelm II . The guest performance in Potsdam begins on October 27th, on November 14th he gives the king his approval and on December 15th Iffland receives his official appointment as director.

In 1801 and 1808 he made guest appearances in Vienna for a few weeks :

“We owe the pleasure of being able to admire Mr Iffland to the kk Hoftheaterdirektion, which spares no expense in summoning the rarest talents. This artist, respected as a model by all stages, also fulfills the highest expectations and celebrates a triumph of art in every role. "

At this theater in Vienna, he also met the playwright and actress Johanna Franul von Weißenthurn , whose works were very popular at the time and were performed over 900 times. He only narrowly missed the sensational, tragic early death of court actress Betty Roose .

Iffland also appeared in private circles and salons:

"Mr. Iffland is still in Vienna, appears in every role with increasing applause, also gives masterful declamations in selected circles, which can claim taste and feeling, and is paid very freely."

On October 23, 1808 Iffland could be seen again in Berlin:

“Yesterday, after his return from Vienna, Mr. Iffland appeared again at the local theater for the first time [...]. Wreaths of flowers were thrown from the side boxes onto the theater, says one of our newspapers, and everyone present received general cheers from the great artist, who at the end of the play gave the eagerly desired assurance that he would not part with his dear Berliners. The whole evening was a triumph of art and love. "

The multiple services he earned in improving the Berlin stage earned him the rank of director of the royal theater in 1811 . Under his leadership, Berlin developed into one of the leading theater cities in Germany.

Iffland died on September 22, 1814 in Berlin. His grave is located in Cemetery II of the Jerusalem and New Church congregation in Kreuzberg . The grave with a black granite plaque in a brick wall with the inscription Iffland / died 1814 is in the field SM. Iffland's final resting place is an honor grave of the State of Berlin .

Theater ticket for Kabale und Liebe from May 3, 1784 with Iffland in the role of valet.
Berlin memorial plaque on the house, Charlottenstrasse 33, in Berlin-Mitte
Iffland's grave

family

In 1796 Iffland married Margaretha Louise Greuhm (* October 3, 1760; † September 1, 1819) a daughter of the Darmstadt government councilor Georg Nicolaus Greuhm and Marie Regine Louise Hert . The marriage remained childless.

Honors

Iffland received the satyr buttons from Goethe as an award for the most important actor of his time.

In 1790 he was named the first honorary citizen of the then Nassau royal seat by the Saarbrücken magistrate. The Ifflandstrasse was named after Iffland in the so-called “actors' quarter ” in Hamburg-Hohenfelde . There are other Ifflandstraßen in Berlin, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Hanover, Ludwigshafen, Munich and Gotha.

The Iffland spring , which is located in the Seeberg near Gotha, is named after him . Here he met with colleagues to learn their roles.

On March 27, 2017 , a Berlin memorial plaque was unveiled at his former place of residence, Berlin-Mitte , Charlottenstrasse 33 .

estate

Iffland's extensive correspondence archive, previously believed to be lost, comprising 6,000 documents in 34 volumes, appeared in public in an auction announced at the end of 2013 and withdrawn shortly afterwards. It was from the estate of the theater director in the archives of theater from 1929 into the new Berlin Theater Museum passes, from where it then finally in 1944 sometime after its decay in the archives of the Academy of Arts Germans arrived. From there it then disappeared in a way that has not yet been clarified. In 2012 the volumes by Hugo Fetting were sold to a Viennese antiquarian bookshop. How he came into possession of the volumes is unclear.

André Schmitz (SPD), Berlin's State Secretary for Culture (until February 2014), commented that the Iffland Archive is a "cultural asset of national standing that must remain in Berlin". The state of Berlin filed a complaint. The ownership structure has not yet been clearly clarified.

The German Federal Government was involved in clarifying the matter . Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters said:

“The case shows that the restitution of art and cultural assets from the former GDR , combined with increased provenance research , must be clearly clarified. We are preparing a corresponding amendment to the existing law on the protection of cultural property . "

- Daily mirror

An agreement was reached between the State of Berlin and the provider: the volumes with the Iffland correspondence were returned to the State of Berlin in return for reimbursement of its costs of 15,000 euros.

Iffland Ring

The Iffland-Ring is awarded in a will by its bearer to what is in his opinion the "most important and worthy stage artist in German-speaking theater for life".

Works

As an actor, Iffland was less characterized by genius than by an artistically calculated representation. Charged and funny as well as cozy touching roles that belong to the sphere of family and bourgeois life succeeded best . His appearance alone made him less capable of tragic and heroic roles.

As a playwright he is most important in portraying morals; his plays show less moralizing breadth than an extraordinary knowledge of the stage and people and a cozy, moral tendency.

Essays

  • Fragments about human representation (Gotha 1785) ( online )
  • Theory of Acting Art (Berlin 1815, 2 volumes) ( Volume 1 online )
  • Almanac for theater and theater fans (Berlin 1806–11, 5 volumes)

Stage plays (selection)

Text output

  • August Wilhelm Iffland. A selection of theatrical works , 10 volumes in 5 volumes, Leipzig 1858–1860. Reprint: Hildesheim 2006.
  • Johannes Birgfeld, Claude Conter (ed.): The comet. A farce in one elevator (1799), Hannover 2006, ISBN 3-932324-40-4 .
  • Alexander Košenina (ed.): Albert von Thurneisen. A tragedy in four acts , Hannover 2008 2 .
  • Alexander Košenina (ed.): Contributions to the art of acting. Letters on the art of acting (1781/82); Fragments about the representation of people on the German stages (1785), Hannover 2009.
  • Klaus Gerlach (ed.): Revolutionary dramas [Figaro in Germany, The cockades, The inheritance of the father], Hanover 2011.
  • Alexander Košenina (ed.): Crimes out of honor. A serious family painting in five acts. Hanover 2014. ISBN 978-3-86525-427-6 .

Autobiography

Letters

  • August Wilhelm Iffland and August von Kotzebue: Correspondence . Edited by Alexander Košenina. Hannover 2020 (= Theatertexte special volume 3). ISBN 978-3-86525-779-6

Student (selection)

literature

Older secondary literature can be found on the Wikisource page .

  • Joseph Kürschner :  Iffland, August Wilhelm . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 14, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1881, pp. 6-13.
  • Siegfried David: August Wilhelm Iffland's art of acting until the end of his time in Mannheim (1796). Kruse, Bruchsal 1933.
  • Hugo Fetting : The repertoire of the Berlin Royal National Theater under the direction of August Wilhelm Iffland (1796–1814) taking into account the artistic principles and cultural-political factors of its design. Greifswald 1978 (Univ., Diss. A).
  • Karl-Heinz Klingenberg: Iffland and Kotzebue as dramatists (= contributions to German classical music. Treatises, vol. 15). Arion, Weimar 1962.
  • Viktor Reimann : The Iffland-Ring. Legend and story of an artist idol. German, Vienna a. a. 1962.
  • Hans-Gerhard Winter:  Iffland, August Wilhelm. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 10, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1974, ISBN 3-428-00191-5 , pp. 120-123 ( digitized version ).
  • Sigrid Salehi: August Wilhelm Iffland's dramatic work. Attempt to re-evaluate. Lang, Frankfurt am Main a. a. 1990, ISBN 3-631-43323-9 (dissertation, RWTH Aachen, 1989).
  • Annemarie Fischer: “About physical eloquence”. Iffland's Jewish roles as a movement outlined by the graphic artists and engravers Gebrüder Henschel. In: Claudia Jeschke, Helmut Zedelmaier (ed.): Other bodies - strange movements. Theatrical and public productions in the 19th century (= cultural-historical perspectives. Vol. 4). Lit, Münster 2005, pp. 293-312.
  • Klaus Gerlach (ed.): An experimental poetics. Texts on the Berlin National Theater. Wehrhahn, Hanover 2007.
  • Klaus Gerlach (Ed.): The Berlin theater costume of the Iffland era. August Wilhelm Iffland as theater director, actor and stage reformer. Academy, Berlin 2009.
  • Mark-Georg Dehrmann, Alexander Košenina (Ed.): Ifflands Dramas. A lexicon. Wehrhahn, Hanover 2009.
  • Alexander Košenina: Iffland plays with Schiller: Franz Moor as an advocate for a new stage aesthetic. In: Peter-André Alt , Marcel Lepper , Ulrich Raulff (eds.): Schiller, the player. Göttingen 2013, pp. 107–125.
  • Detlef Wilkens: August-Wilhelm Iffland, the forgotten giant from the triumvirate of classicism. Life, career, work and significance for our time today. Göttingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-86844-111-6 .
  • Heiko Postma : »I read the comedy notes like books of wisdom« About the actor, theater director and playwright August Wilhelm Iffland (1759–1814). JMB, Hannover 2014, ISBN 978-3-944342-58-0 .
  • Klaus Gerlach: August Wilhelm Iffland's Berlin stage. “Theatrical Artistic Management and Economy”. De Gruyter, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-11-037846-7 .
  • Alexander Košenina: Iffland and Schiller's dramatic start from Mannheim's stage ramp. In: Thomas Wortmann (Ed.): Mannheimer Beginnings. Contributions to the founding years of the Mannheim National Theater 1777–1820, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2017, pp. 135–150, ISBN 3-8353-3017-9 .

Web links

Commons : August Wilhelm Iffland  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: August Wilhelm Iffland  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Klaus Friedrich: Famous and yet forgotten - Iffland mixed up the theater scene on the Saar in the 18th century. In: Saarbrücker Zeitung , April 16, 2009, available online alongside other newspaper articles from Maudrich-Verlag .
  2. ↑ See newspaper for the elegant world, August 4, 1801, no. 93, there the report "Iffland in Vienna, Vienna July 4, 1801".
  3. ^ See Augsburgische Ordinari Postzeitung, Nro. 224, Saturday, Sept. 17th, Anno 1808, p. 1, as digital copy  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / bvbm1.bib-bvb.de  
  4. ^ See Augsburgische Ordinari Postzeitung, Nro. 234, Thursday, Sept. 29, Anno 1808, p. 3, as digitized version .
  5. ^ See Augsburgische Ordinari Postzeitung, Nro. 266, Saturday, November 5th, Anno 1808, p. 2, as a digitized version .
  6. ↑ Jürgen Kaube: Curious inheritance find. The Iffland robber pistol. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , January 7, 2014, accessed January 8, 2014 .
  7. ^ Tilman Krause: Iffland's estate. Great testimony to Berlin's self-forgetfulness. Die Welt , January 8, 2014, accessed January 8, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Peter von Becker: The Iffland estate, resurrected from ruins. Der Tagesspiegel , January 7, 2014, accessed on January 8, 2014 .
  9. ↑ see also: Ruth Freydank: Der Fall Berliner Theatermuseum Part I: History - Images - Documents; Part II. Relics of a former theater library - documentation. Berlin: Pro BUSINESS, 2011, ISBN 3-86805-901-6
  10. ^ Lothar Müller and Stephan Speicher: Estate of August Wilhelm Iffland. Merchants in the theater. Sueddeutsche.de , January 7, 2014, accessed January 8, 2014 .
  11. ↑ Land filed charges against collectors. Berlin demands return of Iffland estate. (No longer available online.) Rbb-online.de , January 7, 2014, archived from the original on January 8, 2014 ; accessed on January 8, 2014 .
  12. ↑ Peter von Becker : Minister of State Monika Grütters on the Ifflands letter archive How things will go on with Iffland. Tagesspiegel , January 16, 2014, accessed January 9, 2014 .
  13. ↑ https://www.welt.de/newsticker/dpa_nt/infoline_nt/boulevard_nt/article126214420/Iffland-Archiv-gerettet-Berlin-erwirbt-Nachlass.html

Remarks

  1. ^ Full text Almanac volumes 1907, 1908, 1909, 1911, 1912 at Google Books
personal data
SURNAME Iffland, August Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German actor, theater director and playwright
DATE OF BIRTH April 19, 1759
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH September 22, 1814
Place of death Berlin