Friedrich Maximilian Klinger

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Friedrich Maximilian Klinger after a chalk drawing by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Friedrich Maximilian Klinger , 1780 by Klinger (* 17th February 1752 in Frankfurt am Main , † February 25 . Jul / 9. March  1831 greg. In Tartu , Governorate of Livonia , Russian Empire ) was a German poet and playwright . His drama Sturm und Drang gave its name to the entire literary movement of the genius era .

Klinger, who held high posts in the educational - military field in Imperial Russian services , headed the Cadet Corps and the Imperial Russian Pagen Corps . Most recently, Friedrich Maximilian Klinger was curator at the University of Dorpat . With the Order of St. George, he wore the highest-ranking Imperial Russian Order of Merit .

Life

Origin and family

Friedrich Maximilian Klinger was the second child of Johannes Klinger , a miller's son from Pfaffen-Beerfurth in the Odenwald , from the Klinger family of millers who had been in Beerfurth since 1483 and who was recruited as a constable in the city's artillery . The paternal grandfather Friedrich Maximilian Klinger is mentioned in relevant biographical encyclopedias with the miller Johannes Klinger zu Pfaffen-Beerfurth of the same name, which is confirmed by family history research from the Hessian Odenwald with direct reference to the Klinger family.

Klinger, who originally wanted to go to North America to the United States in order to pursue a military career there, had relatives who immigrated from the Odenwald to Pennsylvania in his agnatic family , including Johann Philipp Klinger from Pfaffen-Beerfurth. His daughter Elizabeth Klinger was married to the diplomat 's grandson of the same name, John Conrad Weiser . Weiser's cousins ​​were General Peter Muhlenberg , the first Speaker of the House of Representatives Frederick Muhlenberg, and the theologian Henry Muhlenberg .

In contrast to the lexical publications, Klinger's paternal grandmother is not named Anna Barbara Müller, but is reproduced as Anna Barbara Boßler .

With that, Klinger was a grandcousin of the music publisher Heinrich Philipp Boßler through his paternal-grandmother ancestry , who is documented as the grandson of the high-prince Hesse-Darmstadt court gunsmith Johann Peter Boßler . The master gunsmith Boßler zu Darmstadt belonged to the brothers of Anna Barbara Klinger born through his father, the gunsmith, gunsmith, constable and burgrave of Lichtenberg Christian Boßler Bossler.

biography

Friedrich Maximilian Klinger 1807

In 1760 Friedrich Maximilian Klinger lost his father at the age of eight. His mother Cornelia Margareta Dorothea geb. Fuchs, a chambermaid at the landgrave's court in Homburg, had to feed the son and two daughters as a shopkeeper and laundress. Although Klinger grew up in modest circumstances, he was able to attend grammar school in Frankfurt thanks to the support of Professor Zink .

As early as 1772 in Frankfurt he made contact with the representatives of a young generation of authors who were gathering around Goethe . Among them were the greats Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz and Heinrich Leopold Wagner as well as other representatives of literature. His apartment in Rittergässchen provided space for the writers' meetings. Thanks to the financial help of his childhood friend Goethe, he was able to start studying law at what was then Ludwigs University in Gießen in 1774 .

Klinger was also known to the letter writer Albertine von Grün . Albertine raved about the beautiful young Friedrich Maximilian Klinger, who only shared this crush for a short time. At Ludwig Julius Friedrich Hoepfner Albertine wrote from green through her feelings for Klinger:

“Even though I'm not a casuistic friend, I can certainly assure you that if you and Klinger were in the same mortal danger, and I could only save one of you: I would certainly not stand in line for a moment to save you and him to perish. But then I would rush after myself without hesitation. "

- Albertine von Grün : 23. Höpfner to his bride . In: Letters from the Friends of Göthe, Herder, Höpfner and Merck

After his initial success as a playwright, he decided in 1776 to leave the university and first go to Weimar . After still not enlightened break with Goethe, who regard Klinger on Goethe's displeasure dropout and his unannounced appearance was due in Weimar, concluded Klinger to 1776 with the manuscript of his new play Sturm und Drang as a dramaturge of the acting troupe Abel Seyler on. On July 24, 1776, Johann Wolfgang Goethe wrote the following to Johann Heinrich Merck about Klinger :

"Klinger can't walk with us, he hugs me, I told him, he was beside himself about it and didn't understand it and I couldn't explain it, nor did I like it."

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe : Goethe on Klinger . In: Goethe yearbook

When there was no financial success, he was recruited with the help of Goethe's brother-in-law Johann Georg Schlosser in the War of the Bavarian Succession and traveled through Bohemia from summer 1778 to spring 1779 . After the end of the war, he returned to his friend in Emmendingen in the hope of a new letter of recommendation. Following the inspiration of the composer Philipp Christoph Kayser , he was accepted into the Masonic Lodge Modestia cum libertate in Zurich in 1779 .

In 1780, through Schlosser's connections, Klinger was hired as an orderly officer with the rank of lieutenant in the naval battalion of the Russian heir to the throne, Grand Duke Paul in Petersburg, and at the same time as a reader of his wife Maria Feodorovna . In the entourage of the Grand Duke he undertook a trip to Europe from 1781 to 1782, which took him through Vienna , Italy , Paris and Germany. Then Klinger tried his military luck in the campaign against the Turks , which failed due to the rapid peace treaties. In 1785 he was enlisted as a cadet officer in the St. Petersburg Land Cadet Corps , which later became the 1st  Cadet Corps , where he made a career as a military educator.

Resting place of the writer and Imperial Russian military officer Friedrich Maximilian Klinger

In 1787 Klinger married the Russian noblewoman Elisabeth Alexandrowna Alexejewa, a natural daughter of Grigorij Orlow , who, contrary to what is stated in the New German Biography in the Genealogical Manual of the Estonian Knighthood, arose from the association Orlov with Catherine II .

Klinger's son Alexander was a staff captain and adjutant to War Minister Barclay de Tolly . He died in 1812 at the age of 21.

In 1801 Klinger became major general in the army and head of the cadet corps. In 1802 he was appointed head of the page corps. He also served at the Ministry of Popular Education. From 1803 he was curator of the school district and the University of Dorpat in what is now Tartu in Estonia , where he came into contact with Karl Morgenstern and August Thieme, among others . In 1811 he reached the rank of lieutenant general . In the course of the restoration, Klinger was relieved of his offices in 1816. He subsequently withdrew from public life. Klinger died on February 25, 1831, eight days after his 79th birthday in Dorpat.

When Goethe received the news of Klinger's death, he said:

“That was a loyal, firm, tough guy like no one else. In earlier times I also had a lot of torment with him because he was also such a power genius who didn't quite know what he wanted. "

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe : thirteenth chapter . In: Goethe - Artwork of Life

Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger is buried in Saint Petersburg in the Old Smolensk Lutheran Cemetery . Klinger's extensive private library, which was built in 1780 and contains mainly humanistic literature, was handed over to Dorpat University by his widow in 1844.

Klinger's great-nephew, Max Rieger , acts as the biographer of his famous great-uncle Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger. Rieger's daughter Elisabeth was in turn married to the entrepreneur Emanuel August Merck from the Darmstadt family of Merck .

meaning

Illustration to a work by Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger

Klinger is one of the most important playwrights of the literary movement Sturm und Drang . His drama of the same name , initially published in 1776 under the title Der Wirrwarr , which was renamed at the suggestion of Christoph Kaufmann , ultimately gave the epoch its name. Other important works of the genius period are The Twins and Simsone Grisaldo .

In his works he took up the dramaturgical idiosyncrasies of William Shakespeare and the philosophical views of Jean-Jacques Rousseau . They contain both socially critical and strong emotional moments.

Since around 1778 the poet wrote a number of the trivial novels and dramas that show affinities to Rococo literature, among other things in financial need . In his later creative period, starting around 1785, he followed the rules of French classicism , which he sought to reconcile with the ideals of his youth. Representative for this period are the dramas Konradin , The Favorite , the two Medea dramas and Damocles .

From 1791 Klinger planned a decade of philosophical novels , of which only eight were completed and one was handed down as a fragment. They were created in the period 1791–1798. Faust's life, deeds, and journey to hell are the best known of them. In his philosophical novels, Klinger unites significant contemporary tendencies in literature, anthropology and philosophy and is therefore an important representative of the Late Enlightenment . In his critical view of history and society, he leans particularly on Jean-Jacques Rousseau, but also on Voltaire and Immanuel Kant .

The conclusion of his works were reflections and thoughts on various objects of the world and literature , a collection of aphorisms on contemporary topics.

Klinger exchanged extensive letters with Goethe, with whom he resumed his old friendship in 1811, and with many who visited him in Saint Petersburg and Dorpat, including Fanny Tarnow , Johann Gottfried Seume and Ernst Moritz Arndt .

After the death of the French Enlightenment, philosophers and encyclopedists Denis Diderot whose library was the Zarinnenhof transferred, the date in France unpublished manuscript of Le Neveu de Rameau from 1761, found that Klinger in Diderot library and a copy first the publisher Johann Friedrich Hartknoch offered in Riga , but refused to publish it.

Works

  • Otto (knight drama), 1775
  • The suffering woman (tragedy), Weygand, Leipzig 1775. ( online )
  • The Twins (tragedy in five acts), Lodge Master, Vienna 1776. ( online )
  • The new Arria (tragedy), Mylius, Berlin 1776. ( online )
  • Simsone and Grisaldo (play), Mylius, Berlin 1776. ( online )
  • Sturm und Drang (play), 1776. ( Ed. Reclam, Leipzig 1870 online )
  • Scenes from Pyrrhus' Life and Death (dram. Fragment), 1776–1779
  • The exiled son of the gods (dram. Fragment), 1777
  • Orpheus (novel in 5 parts), Legrand, Geneva 1778–1780. ( Part 1 online ), ( Part 2 ), ( Part 3 )
  • Stilpo and his children (tragedy), Thurneysen, Basel 1780. ( online )
  • Prince Seidenwurm (comedy), Legrand, Geneva 1780. ( online )
  • The dervish (comedy), 1780
  • Prince Formoso's fiddle bow and the Princess Sanaclara violin (novel), Legrand, Geneva 1780. ( Part 1 online ), ( Part 2 )
  • Plimplamplasko, the high spirit, today genius (satire, together with Lavater and Jakob Sarasin ), 1780. ( online )
  • The wrong players (comedy), Kurzbeck, Vienna 1782. ( online )
  • The Oath (in the 2nd version The Oath Against Marriage ) (comedy), originated in 1782/83, printed in Theater 1786–1787
  • Elfride (tragedy), Thurneysen, Basel 1783. ( online )
  • The story of the Golden Rooster (novel), 1785. ( online )
  • Konradin (tragedy), written in 1784, printed in theater 1786–1787
  • The favorite (play), was written in 1785, printed in theater 1786–1787
  • Medea or Das Schicksal (later renamed Medea in Corinth ) (tragedy), originated in 1786, printed in theater 1786–1787
  • Aristodemos (tragedy), originated in 1787, printed in Neues Theater 1790
  • Roderico (tragedy), was written in 1788, printed in Neues Theater 1790
  • Damocles (tragedy), was written in 1788, printed in Neues Theater 1790
  • Die zwo Freundinnen (comedy), originated in 1788, printed in Neues Theater 1790
  • Oriantes (tragedy), 1790. ( online )
  • Bambino's sentimental-political, comic-tragic story (revision of Orpheus), 1791
  • Medea on the Caucasus (tragedy), 1791
  • Faust's life, deeds and journey to hell (novel), 1791 ( digitized and full text in the German text archive )
  • History of Giafar des Barmeciden (novel), 1792–1794
  • Story of Raphaels de Aquillas (novel), 1793
  • Journeys before the Flood (novel), 1795. ( online )
  • The Faust of the Orientals, or Walks Ben Hafis (novel), 1797. ( Ed. 1810 online )
  • History of a modern German (novel), Hartknoch, Leipzig 1798. ( online )
  • Sahir, Eva's firstborn in Paradise (revision of the story of the Golden Rooster), 1798
  • The man of the world and the poet (novel), Hartknoch, Leipzig 1798. ( online )
  • The premature awakening of the genius of mankind (fragment of a novel), 1803
  • Reflections and Thoughts on Various Objects in the World and Literature , 1803–1805

Between 1809 and 1816 his collected works were published in Königsberg (ed. V. Nicolovius) and in Vienna in 1810 “All Philosophical Novels” in 12 volumes each.

Orders and awards

Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger was a knight of various high-ranking Imperial Russian orders of merit and wore their badges in different order classes .

The award of all classes of the orders of St. George and St. Vladimir brought with it the elevation to the hereditary nobility , whose status in the Russian Empire was always that of the service nobility . The 4th class of the Order of St. George was also associated with the rank of colonel .

literature

in order of appearance:

Web links

Commons : Friedrich Maximilian Klinger  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Friedrich Maximilian Klinger  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. Klinger was raised to the service aristocracy because of his Imperial Russian medals. The title of nobility only appeared in German-speaking countries, as the titles in Russian do not appear in the name.
  2. Marie-Louise Seidenfaden and Brigitte Köhler: "... now we are in America" ​​- South Hesse in the New World - reports and letters . Ed .: Museum Schloss Lichtenberg . 1st edition. Museumsverlag Schloss Lichtenberg, Fischbachtal 1988, ISBN 3-923366-04-3 , p. 1 .
  3. ^ Mary K. Klinger: The Klingers - From the Odenwald, Hesse, Germany, Ca. 1610-1989 . Gateway Pr., Baltimore 1989, OCLC 20796966 , pp. 2-4 .
  4. ^ Karl Schwarz: Albertine von Grün and her friends - biographies and collection of letters with historical and literary-historical notes . Leipzig 1872, p. 15-16 ( digitized version ).
  5. Marie-Louise Seidenfaden and Brigitte Köhler: "... now we are in America" ​​- South Hesse in the New World - reports and letters . Ed .: Museum Schloss Lichtenberg. 1st edition. Museumsverlag Schloss Lichtenberg, Fischbachtal 1988, ISBN 3-923366-04-3 , p. 1-2, 3, 4, 7 .
  6. Frederick Sheely Weiser: The Weiser family - a genealogy of the family of John Conrad Weiser, the elder (d. 1746) Prepared on the two hundred fiftieth anniversary of his arrival in America, 1710-1760 . Ed .: John Conrad Weiser Family Association. Manheim 1960, OCLC 593239 , p. 8, 219-230 .
  7. ^ Mary K. Klinger: The Klingers - From the Odenwald, Hesse, Germany, Ca. 1610-1989 . Gateway Pr., Baltimore 1989, OCLC 20796966 , pp. 29, 38, 41 .
  8. ^ Heinrich Wolf: Family Book Reichelsheim 1643-1875 . Ed .: Andreas Stephan. 1st edition. tape 2 - With Pfaffen-Beerfurth, Reichelsheim, Rohrbach, Unter-Easter and the directories. GENDI-Verlag, Otzberg 2018, ISBN 978-3-946295-61-7 , Pfaffen-Beerfurth , p. 969 f .
  9. Marcel Boßler: The famous Sturm und Drang poet Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger from Frankfurt with clear Odenwald roots . In: Hessian Family History Association e. V. (Hrsg.): Hessische Genealogie . Volume 3, Issue 2, 2020, ISSN  2626-0220 , p. 27-29 ( GenWiki ).
  10. Hans Schneider: The music publisher Heinrich Philipp Bossler 1744-1812. With bibliographic overviews and an appendix by Mariane Kirchgeßner and Boßler. Self-published by Hans Schneider, Tutzing 1985, ISBN 3-7952-0500-X , p. 15 .
  11. ^ Diethard Köhler : Families in Billings, Nonrod, Meßbach, Steinau, Hausen, Lichtenberg 1635–1750 . Volume III: Address book front Odenwald 1635–1750. Ober-Ramstadt 1987, OCLC 74995810 , Hausen and Lichtenberg: Families before 1700 .
  12. Marcel Bossler: A small text on the genealogy and ancestry of the court rifle maker in Darmstadt Johann Peter Boßler (Bosler) illuminating as well as the history, meaning and origin of the early Boßler family via the Lichtenberg office to Darmstadt and Neckarsteinach . Ed .: Marcel Bossler. Volume I. - History of the Hessian Boßler family. Self-published by M. Bossler, Bad Rappenau 2019, ISBN 978-3-00-063737-7 , p. 16 .
  13. ^ Carl Schwartz: Albertine von Grün and her friends - biographies and collection of letters with historical and literary-historical notes . Ernst Fleischer, Leipzig 1872, p. 12 ( digitized version ).
  14. ^ Karl Wagner (ed.): Letters from the Friends of Göthe, Herder, Höpfner and Merck - an independent series of the two Merck letter collections published in 1835 and 1838 . Leipzig 1847, p. 60 ( digitized version ).
  15. Johann Wolfgang Goethe: Johann Wolfgang Goethe letters - historical-critical edition . Ed .: Georg Kurscheidt, Norbert Oellers and Elke Richter. de Gruyter, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-05-006504-5 , p. 345 ( digitized version ).
  16. ^ Johann Wolfgang Goethe: Goethe yearbook . Ed .: Ludwig Geiger . tape 3 . Frankfurt a. M. 1882, p. 272 ( digitized version ).
  17. see German biography
  18. Otto Magnus von Stackelberg (Ed.): Genealogical Handbook of the Estonian Knighthood , Vol .: 1, Görlitz, [1931], p. 28.
  19. Christoph Hering: Friedrich Maximilian Klinger - The man of the world as a poet . de Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2019, ISBN 978-3-11-000371-0 , life outline , p. 20 ( digitized version ).
  20. Volker Meid: Reclam's Lexicon of German-Language Authors, 2nd updated and expanded edition, Reclam, Ditzingen, 2006 ISBN 978-3-15-017664-1
  21. ^ Johann Wolfgang Goethe: Goethe - Artwork of Life Biography - Biography . Ed .: Rüdiger Safranski . Carl Hanser Verlag , Münschen 2013, p. Chapter thirteenth ( digitized version ).
  22. ^ RAI University of Karlsruhe
  23. ^ Bernhard Fabian : Handbook of German historical book stocks. Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Volume 7.2, Georg Olms Verlag, 1998, p. 117
  24. Max Rieger: Friedrich Maximilian Klinger - his life and works . Bergstrasse , Darmstadt 1880, OCLC 185545778 .
  25. ^ Rieger, Friedrich Maximilian Heinrich Leonhard. Hessian biography. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
  26. Friedrich Paldamus: German poets and prose writers from the middle of the 15th century up to our time - portrayed after their life and work . Second division. - Second volume. Verlag BG Teubner, Leipzig 1861, p. 328 ( digitized version ).
  27. ^ Martin Ludwig Schlesinger: Toussaint-Langenscheidt method - Langenscheidts special dictionaries land and people in Russia . 2nd Edition. Langenscheidt , Berlin-Schöneberg 1909, OCLC 63923971 , p. 4 .