Emil Strauss
Emil Strauss (born January 31, 1866 in Pforzheim ; † August 10, 1960 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a German novelist , storyteller and playwright.
Life
Emil Strauss came from a family of jewelry manufacturers in Pforzheim. First he studied philosophy , German and economics in Freiburg im Breisgau , Berlin and Lausanne . He broke off his studies early and decided to become a freelance writer . In 1892 his first story, The Animal and the Human Friend, appeared on the Freie Bühne .
Repelled by urban bourgeois life, by pursuit of money and work, he turned to the life reform movement . Together with the Kaiserstuhl writer Emil Gött and others, Strauss lived in 1891 as a member of a “vegetarian colony” on the Rheinburg in Gailingen on the Upper Rhine (Both Emil Strauss and Emil Gött frequented the house of the surgeon Gustav Killian in Freiburg, as did other cultural workers from Baden University City). After the failure of this agricultural settlement attempt on a community basis and a further attempt, undertaken together with Emil Gött, of alternative, livestock-free agriculture with so-called spade culture near Breisach , Strauss undertook long trips to Switzerland , Italy and finally to get out of the "German domestication “To break out, to Brazil in 1892 . After spending two years in South America , he returned to his homeland in southwest Germany and settled in the most simple of circumstances in a rural area near Ludwigshafen on Lake Constance .
At the beginning of the 20th century, Strauss' books Der Engelwirt (approx. 190,000 copies sold) and Freund Hein appeared , which attracted broader attention; Samuel Fischer wrote to Hermann Hesse in 1903 that he considered him “our strongest hope”. Strauss had married Liesbeth Marschall two years earlier. Between 1904 and 1918 he published lively, and he also repeatedly changed his place of residence. In view of the defeat of Germany in the First World War and the "oblivion during his lifetime", he increasingly turned to the political (radical) right in the field of tension between life-reforming individualism and idealistic ideas of the empire. The political reorientation manifested itself in the 1923 drama Vaterland , which was banned after its premiere in 1924. Critics spoke of a “monument to fanaticism”.
In contradiction to this, Strauss received in 1925 - in the same year his rural property proved to be economically untenable - the "Poet Prize of the Association of Art Friends" and in 1926 was appointed Doctor honoris causa and appointed to the Prussian Academy of the Arts . Even politically different-minded artists such as Oskar Loerke in the S. Fischer Almanach or Arnold Zweig in 1929 in the Weltbühne still paid tribute to or referred to Strauss. In 1931 Strauss left the academy together with Erwin Guido Kolbenheyer and Wilhelm Schäfer because of differences over the ideological orientation of the institution.
In 1930 Strauss joined the NSDAP . After the Prussian Academy of the Arts was brought into line in 1933 and 40 Jewish academy members who were unpopular for other reasons were removed, a place became available for him. At the same time he answered the request for a contribution to the book burning in 1933 with the assurance that the "fight" would be waged purely spiritually, as in the 30 years [!] Before. In 1936 he was appointed to the Reich Culture Senate by Joseph Goebbels and received the Goethe Medal and the Erwin von Steinbach Prize . His 70th birthday was honored in the Nazi press. Even during the Nazi and war times he was able to continue to publish new works ( Das Riesenspielzeug 1935 and Lebenstanz 1940), but especially the new editions printed by Carl Hanser Verlag from 1949 onwards achieved high print runs in the FRG. From 1955 Strauss lived in a nursing home near Freiburg, where he also died. A few months before his death, he burned most of his literary estate and all letters accessible to him. He was buried in the main cemetery in Pforzheim .
reception
In 1960, four days after Strauss's death, Hermann Hesse wrote: I noticed his inclination to racial hatred, rather the Aryan contempt for other races he had brought with him from Brazil, sometimes late, sometimes not taken very seriously. Soon afterwards he went to see Hitler. It was not as you can see that the Nazis had taken him; a good ten years before 33 he went with them enthusiastically on his own initiative. (Letter to Werner Weber August 14, 1960)
After the end of the war, his writing Vaterland ( Langen / Müller , Munich 1936) was placed on the list of literature to be segregated in the Soviet occupation zone .
Awards and honors
- 1924: Honorary doctorate from the University of Freiburg .
- 1936: Goethe Medal for Art and Science
- 1936: Erwin von Steinbach Prize
- 1936: Honorary citizenship of Freiburg
- 1941: Johann Peter Hebel Prize
- 1942: Franz Grillparzer Prize
Publications (selection)
- Human ways , 1899.
- Don Pedro , drama, 1899.
- The Engelwirt. A Swabian story , 1901.
- Friend Hein. A life story , 1902.
- Crossroads , novel, 1904.
- Wedding , drama, 1908.
- Hans and Grete , Novellas, 1909.
- The Naked Man , novel, 1912.
- The mirror , novel, 1919.
- Fatherland , drama, 1923.
- The Veil , Stories, 1931.
- The giant toy , novel, 1934.
- Life dance , novel, 1940.
- Dreiklang , short stories, 1939/1946/1947.
- Ludens , Memoirs, 1956.
- The Run , novella, 1956.
literature
- Adolf Abele: Emil Strauss, essence and work. Traunstein 1955, DNB 480625301 (Dissertation University of Munich, Philosophical Faculty, December 15, 1955, 50 pages).
- Hubert Braun: The novels and the novel by Emil Straussen. [Bonn] 1953, DNB 480365008 (dissertation University of Bonn December 23, 1953, 195 pages).
- Kurt Brem: Emil Strauss. Basics of his worldview. 1941, DNB 570027993 (Dissertation University of Munich, Philosophical Faculty, 1942, 79 pages).
- Thomas Diecks: Strauss, Emil Josef. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 25, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-428-11206-7 , pp. 505-507 ( digitized version ).
- Jan Ehlenberger: Adolescence and suicide in school novels by Emil Strauss, Hermann Hesse, Bruno Wille and Friedrich Torberg (= Bayreuth contributions to literary studies , volume 28). Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 978-3-631-55234-6 (dissertation University of Bayreuth 2003).
- Fritz Endres: Emil Strauss. One try. Langen-Müller, Munich 1936, DNB 573005907 .
- Liselotte Fischer: The image of man in the novels and short stories by Emil Strauss , o. O. 1951, DNB 480847800 (dissertation University of Freiburg [im Breisgau], Philosophical Faculty, November 15, 1951).
- Robert Fritzsch: The relationships between men and women at Emil Strauss. Erlangen 1953, DNB 480375585 (Dissertation University of Erlangen, Philosophical Faculty, September 16, 1953).
- Gertrude Janota: The Dramas of Emil Strauss , Vienna 1944, DNB 570737702 (Dissertation University of Vienna, Philosophical Faculty, 1944).
- Wenchao Li: The motif of childhood and the figure of the child in German literature at the turn of the century. Investigations into Thomas Mann's "Buddenbrooks", Friedrich Huch's "Mao" and Emil Strauss' "Freund Hein". 1989, DNB 910594260 (dissertation FU Berlin 1990).
- Hugo Meder: The narrative works of Emil Strauss , Limburg an der Lahn 1938, DNB 570894964 (dissertation University of Frankfurt [am Main] 1938).
- Joachim Noob: The student suicide in German literature at the turn of the century (= contributions to modern literary history , volume 3: volume 158). Winter, Heidelberg 1998, ISBN 3-8253-0696-8 (Dissertation University of Oregon 1997, under the title: Non vitae sed scholae discimus: the student suicide in literature at the turn of the century ).
- Hildegard Ohnhäuser: Emil Strauss's giant toy: An investigation. o. O. 1943, DNB 570983223 (Dissertation University of Vienna, Philosophical Faculty, 1944).
- Ilsemarie Rommel: Love in the narrative poetry by Emil Strauss , DNB 571105734 (dissertation University of Jena, Philosophical Faculty, 1945).
- Bärbel Rudin (Ed.): “One can be true”. Documentation on the life and work of Emil Strauss (1866–1960). Exhibition by the city of Pforzheim May 8 to June 14, 1987. 2nd edition, published by the city of Pforzheim. Pforzheim 1990, ISBN 3-980084-38-8 .
- Gertrud Schneider: Personality and community with Emil Strauss , o. O. 1939, DNB 571526594 (dissertation University of Würzburg 1939).
- Werner Schölch: Experience, attitude to life and religiosity with Emil Strauss , o. O. [1951], DNB 480848114 (dissertation University of Freiburg [im Breisgau] February 26, 1951).
- Konrad Strauss: Memories of my father Emil Strauss. Schweier, Kirchheim unter Teck 1990, ISBN 3-921829-32-1 .
- Wilma Werner: The work of Emil Strauss: Reality and symbolism , o. O. 1943, DNB 361330707 (dissertation University of Erlangen 1943).
- Jan Zimmermann: The FVS Foundation's Culture Awards 1935–1945. Presentation and documentation. Published by the Alfred Toepfer Foundation FVS Christians, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-7672-1374-5 .
Web links
- Literature by and about Emil Strauss in the catalog of the German National Library
- Works by and about Emil Strauss in the German Digital Library
- Emil Strauss' autographs in the digital collections of the Badische Landesbibliothek
Individual evidence
- ↑ In the novel Das Riesenspielzeug (1934) the Rheinburg is referred to as "Schloss Rotsaal". See the history of Rheinburg Castle (last accessed on July 20, 2013).
- ↑ Hans Killian: There is only God behind us. Sub umbra dei. A surgeon remembers. Kindler, Munich 1957; here: Licensed edition as Herder paperback (= Herder library. Volume 279). Herder, Freiburg / Basel / Vienna 1975, ISBN 3-451-01779-2 , p. 13.
- ^ Peter Sprengel: History of German-Language Literature 1900–1918. From the turn of the century to the end of the First World War. CH Beck, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-406-52178-9 , p. 40.
- ^ "Der Engelwirt / Zeittafel", Illing, Göttingen 1987.
- ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/pers/beumelburg-01.html .
- ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1948-nslit-s.html .
- ^ University of Freiburg: Poets and thinkers in Freiburg: Emil Strauss.
- ↑ Lever Prize 1941 for Emil Strauss
personal data | |
---|---|
SURNAME | Strauss, Emil |
ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Strauss, Emil |
BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German writer |
DATE OF BIRTH | January 31, 1866 |
PLACE OF BIRTH | Pforzheim |
DATE OF DEATH | August 10, 1960 |
Place of death | Freiburg in Breisgau |