Wilhelm Jordan (writer)

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Wilhelm Jordan Wilhelm Jordan Signature.png

Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Jordan (born February 8, 1819 in Insterburg , East Prussia , † June 25, 1904 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German writer and politician.

Life

As the son of Pastor Karl August Jordan, Jordan attended the Friedrichsschule Gumbinnen and the Royal Litthau Provincial School in Tilsit . From 1838 he studied Protestant theology at the Albertus University in Königsberg and was active in the Corps Littuania . His college friends included the liberals Rudolf Gottschall and Ferdinand Gregorovius . At the homage ceremony for the Prussian royal couple, Jordan and Gregorovius recited the welcoming poems on behalf of the student body. Inspired by Ludwig Feuerbach and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel , he gave up the profession of preacher and switched to philosophy and the natural sciences. At Franz Liszt's honorary doctorate , he put a cap with a golden Albertus on the surprised composer and dedicated a flower of German poetry to him:


You warmed the disciples of Kant and Hegel to a light glow.
They adorned
your head with a doctoral hat in the city on the Pregel
.

After his doctorate as Dr. phil. at the Albertus University (1842) he went to Berlin to work as a writer. Expelled from the city in 1843 for anti-Christian liberal writings, he moved to Leipzig . In 1845/46 he published the magazine Die bewiffene Welt . Jordan was expelled from Leipzig in 1846 after Prince Johann's visit to Leipzig in August 1845 because of political activities . He went to Bremen and worked for the Bremer Zeitung . At times he was her correspondent in Berlin and Paris .

From May 18, 1848 to May 20, 1849, Jordan, who is considered liberal, was a member of the Frankfurt National Assembly for Freienwalde , which he called the “great university of his life”. Originally belonging to the left, he eventually joined Heinrich von Gagern and advocated a small German empire under Prussian leadership. For this reason, in a speech on July 24, 1848 , he spoke out against the restoration of an independent Polish nation-state and against support for the Polish struggle for freedom. In this context, because of the “superiority of the German tribe over most of the Slavic tribes”, he pleaded for a “healthy people's egoism ”, that is, for a division of Poland, a term that quickly became a catchphrase that found an adversary in Robert Blum , but in Polish nationalism experienced a reaction in the form of "national egoism" and was expressed politically most effectively in Roman Dmowski . In addition, Jordan was a marine councilor in the Reich Ministry of Commerce and was involved in building an imperial fleet . After his retirement he went on numerous lecture tours, among other things to make his Nibelungenlied popular. One of them took him to the USA in 1871 .

Act

His literary work is rooted in 19th century historicism . Philosophical and scientific thoughts dominate the poems , plays and novels . His main work is his Nibelungen - Epic , which is written in alliteration . He used the Norse saga and the Hildebrand song as the main sources, but tried to subject the events to a time-related psychological interpretation. In the 19th century he was often referred to as "Nietzsche's forerunner and the pioneer of Darwin in Germany" (quote from René Simon Taube; see below). Today, with two exceptions, his work has been forgotten: his Mysterium Demiurgos and his Edda translation are still used today because of the sensitive language and epic depth. His epic work Demiurgos cannot, as is commonly claimed, be regarded as the “first serious biography of Max Stirner ”. It is more of a literary drawing and not a biographical representation of Max Stirner's life, especially since he is only mentioned in one chapter and not in the entire “Mysterium”. He made a deep impression on Ludwig Klages and his school friend Theodor Lessing .

Works

  • Earthly Fantasies (Poems, 1842)
  • Foam (poems, 1846)
  • Demiurgos (Mystery, 1852)
  • The widow of Agis (drama, 1857)
  • Nibelunge (epic, 1867–68)
  • Through the ear (comedy, 1870)
  • Stanzas and Wands (Poems, 1871)
  • Artur Arden (drama, 1872)
  • Hildebrandt's homecoming (epic, 1874)
  • Epic Letters (1876)
  • Devotions (poems, 1877)
  • His twin brother (comedy, 1883)
  • Exchange disappointed (comedy, 1884)
  • The Sebalds: A novel from the present (novel, 2 volumes, 1885)
  • Two cradles (Roman, 1887)
  • Feli Dora (verse novella, 1889)
  • Edda translation (1889) (new edition Arun-Verlag , Engerda 2002, ISBN 3-935581-03-3 )
  • German blows (poems, 1891)
  • The love deniers (comedy, 1892)
  • Love what you may love (comedy, 1892)
  • Last Songs (Poems, 1892)
  • Demiurgos. A mystery. Sixth book (1854). Leipzig 1999. Stirneriana issue 16. ISBN 3-933287-29-4

Honors

literature

  • Obituary: Academic monthly notebooks , August 1, 1904
  • Josef Bendel: Contemporary Poets. Stuttgart: Metzler 1882.
  • Willibald Jansen: Wilhelm Jordan. Suggestions for studying his works. Berlin: Gerdes u. Hödel 1910. (= For further training of the teacher; 28)
  • Ludwig Klages : Wilhelm Jordan on the 100th birthday. In: Schweizer Illustrierte , Vol. 23, 1919, pp. 125–133.
  • Franz Koch: Wilhelm Jordans 'Demiurgos'. Berlin 1942. (= Treatises of the Prussian Academy of Science, Phil.-Hist. Class .; 1942.1)
  • Karl Schiffner: Wilhelm Jordan. Frankfurt am Main: Osterrieth 1889.
  • Paul Scholz: Wilhelm Jordan's speeches in the Paulskirche. Studies on parliamentary eloquence. Königsberg Prussia: Gräfe u. Unzer 1930
  • Max Schüler : Wilhelm Jordan. Six essays on the 100th anniversary of his birthday on February 8, 1919. Frankfurt am Main: Diesterweg 1919
  • Maurice Reinhold von Stern : Wilhelm Jordan. A German poet and character image. Frankfurt am Main, Lüstenöder 1910.
  • René Simon Taube: The image of Max Stirner in German literature around the middle of the 19th century. (1958), ed. v. Kurt W. Fleming. Leipzig: Max Stirner Archive 1999. (= Stirneriana; 17) - Wilhelm Jordan is one of the first authors to treat Max Stirner in a literary (epic) way, alongside Robert Giseke : Moderne Titanen
  • Egbert Weiß : Corps students in the Paulskirche , in: Einst und Jetzt , special issue 1990, Munich 1990, p. 25
  • Clifford Albrecht Bernd:  Jordan, Wilhelm. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 10, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1974, ISBN 3-428-00191-5 , p. 605 f. ( Digitized version ).

Web links

Commons : Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Jordan  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Wilhelm Jordan  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. Kösener Corp lists 1960, 86/154
  2. Hans Lippold: An Albertus for the composer . Ostpreußenblatt , October 6, 1973
  3. Götz Aly: Anti-Semitism: Envy drove the Germans to hatred of Jews. In: welt.de . June 14, 2012, accessed October 7, 2018 .
  4. ^ Roland Gehrke: The Polish idea of ​​the west up to the re-establishment of the Polish state after the end of the First World War. Genesis and justification of Polish territorial claims against Germany in the age of nationalism , Verlag Herder-Institut Marburg 2001, pp. 74 f., 116-121; ISBN 3-87969-288-2 .