Gustav Frenssen

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Gustav Frenssen

Gustav Frenssen (born October 19, 1863 in Barlt , Dithmarschen ; † April 11, 1945 there ) was a German writer of nationalist nationalism , from 1932 of National Socialism . His works belonged to the mass literature of the German Empire and the Nazi era , which conveyed colonialist , racist and anti-Semitic ideas that were widespread at the time . His grave is in the nature reserve Wodansberg near Windbergen.

Life

Frenssen was born in Barlt as the son of the master carpenter Hermann Frenssen (1829-1919) and his wife Amalie geb. Hansen (1827-1897) born. After elementary school he first attended grammar school in Meldorf , together with the later anti-Semitic literary historian Adolf Bartels , and then because of poor academic performance, that in Husum . After graduation in 1886, he studied theology at the universities of Tübingen , Berlin and Kiel , in 1890 to become second pastor in Hennstedt and in 1892 finally pastor in Hemme . In 1890 he married Anna Walter, the daughter of a teacher.

Literary beginnings and successes

Postcard from 1905

In 1896 he published his first larger work, Die Sandgräfin , and in 1901 the development novel Jörn Uhl , which was very successful with the public ( Hermann Löns : ... this wonderful novel ...) and critics, including "Frenssen-Fan" (Uwe-K . Ketelsen) Rainer Maria Rilke . This success allowed Frenssen to give up his pastor's position in 1902 and to live as a freelance writer . In 1903 he got for his village sermons from the University of Heidelberg the honorary doctorate awarded for theology. In 1905 Hilligenlei appeared and in 1906 Peter Moor's drive to the southwest about the uprising of the Herero and Nama in German Southwest Africa, of which over 100,000 had been sold two months after publication. Nevertheless, Frenssen did not come back to the colonial topic literarily and did not see himself as a "colonial author". In the second decade of the 20th century, Frenssen, whose works have been translated into numerous languages ​​and were particularly popular in Scandinavia, was even nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature . Frenssen was so taken with himself that he could not attribute the fact that he was not selected to his possibly poor quality as a writer, but rather blamed the cabal of a Jewish clique . His works reached a total circulation of around three million copies.

The way to the National Socialists

Sönke Erichsen.jpg
Gustav Frenssen between 1925 and 1930 on a photograph by Nicola Perscheid .

Frenssen's political stance during the empire was nationally conservative. In 1896 he became a member of Friedrich Naumann's National Socialist Association and remained so until its dissolution in 1903. Just like Naumann, he spoke out in favor of German colonies , and even before Hans Grimm and Adolf Bartels he coined the slogan in his novel Die Drei Getreuen (1898) from the people without space . He dealt with contemporary racial writings. Gustav Frenssen lived in Meldorf from 1902 to 1906 and then in Blankenese . In 1919 he moved back to his birthplace in Barlt. Like many Dithmarschers of his time, he was indeed nationally liberal and anti-democratic, but welcomed the October Revolution and at first did not reject the Weimar Republic . He briefly described Walther Rathenau as "the most distinguished head in Germany". But Frenssen basically wanted a "strong Germany with clearly authoritarian features" and became the enemy of the Weimar Republic. From 1923 onwards, there were signs of increased anti-Semitism in his works. In the 1932 presidential election he elected Adolf Hitler .

time of the nationalsocialism

After taking power , he openly supported the NSDAP . In 1933 he signed the pledge of the most loyal allegiance to Hitler, from 1938 onwards he affirmed the exclusion of Jews and advocated euthanasia . Hans Sarkowicz and Alf Mentzer rate the books by Frenssen, published after 1933, as "almost without exception the worst Nazi propaganda". In October 1933 Frenssen was admitted to the co-ordinated Prussian Academy of Arts Poetry, which from 1939 called itself the German Academy of Poetry, and was appointed Honorary Senator of the Reich Association of German Writers, a subdivision of the Reich Chamber of Literature . In 1933 he received the Raabe Prize . In 1938 Hitler awarded him the Goethe Medal for Art and Science .

He was a board member of the Eutin poets' circle founded in 1936 , one of the most important groups of authors in Nazi Germany. In 1936 his book Der Glaube der Nordmark was published , with which he finally turned away from the Christian religion and propagated a kind of Nordic neo-paganism . He now rejected bourgeois-conservative sexual morality . Vorland appeared in 1937 . Brooding , his notes from the years 1920 to 1935. In the fictitious diary contained therein of the Wittschild administration , a Germany in 2023, he advocated radical measures of eugenics and euthanasia . In 1938 he published The Way of Our People .

In 1940 his autobiography life story was published , which is characterized by hostility to the metropolitan area, anti-intellectualism and anti-Semitism, as well as right or wrong - my country! , in which he justified the persecution of the Jews and the National Socialists' pursuit of world power. His penultimate book Lebenskunde was published in 1942. It deals u. a. with the topic of "human discipline". His last book, the short story Der Landvogt von Sylt (1943), is actually about two holders of this office: Uwe Jens Lornsen and his successor Hans Nicolai Frenssen (1798–1833), a distant relative of the author. In the final years of the war, Frenssen mainly worked for radio and the Reich press office of the NSDAP .

Reception in post-war Germany

After his death in 1945, Frenssen was largely forgotten. In the Soviet occupation zone and the German Democratic Republic , many of his works were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out, including the anti-Semitic and anti-democratic monographs explanations on Gustav Frenssen: “The Faith of the North Mark” (1939) by Albert Meerkatz and Gustav Frenssen . Unfolding a Life (1938) from Numme Find Numsen .

In the Federal Republic of Germany, Arno Schmidt Frenssen named a representative of exemplary literary and social anti-modernism in a scenic description and counted him among the “chauvinist agitators”. Because of his public partisanship against “Jews and Jewish artists” before and during the Nazi era, Frenssen was largely responsible for the crimes committed against Jews during National Socialism .

Evaluation in the late 20th and early 21st centuries

For today's scientific research on “Heimatliteratur”, which was largely folk literature and can be assigned to Heimatkunst , Frenssen's work is “paradigmatic” evidence of the “expansion” of Heimatliteratur “into the area of ​​political-agitational journalism”. This is supported by both the "vehemently militaristic perseverance" texts written during the First World War and that he had "helped pave the way for the National Socialists since the beginning of the 1930s".

Regardless of this, Frenssen's journalistic support for the crimes of the Nazi state in the Federal Republic was largely suppressed and the author was honored. Especially in Schleswig-Holstein streets were named after him. It was not until the 1980s - first in Heide in 1983 - that political initiatives emerged which - as in 1986 in Hamburg-Blankenese  - were renamed. The Frenssenstrasse in Kiel-Pries was renamed in 2011 on the grounds that Frenssen “knowingly and willingly put his talents in the service of the National Socialists”. The street was named after him in 1920. In 2014 the Gustav-Frenssen-Strasse followed in Heide, Brunsbüttel and Marne , and in 2015 also in Meldorf .

In 2014, the city of Hanover appointed an advisory board made up of experts to check whether people who gave their names to streets “had active participation in the Nazi regime or serious personal actions against humanity”. He suggested the renaming of the street named after Frenssen in 1967. He "justified the persecution of Jews and euthanasia murders".

Works (selection)

Grave on the Wodansberg
  • The sand countess. Berlin 1896 ( online )
  • The three faithful . Berlin 1898 ( online )
  • Village sermons . 3 volumes. Göttingen 1899–1902
  • A handful of gold. Leipzig 1901
  • Jörn Uhl. Berlin 1901 ( online )
  • Hilligenlei. Berlin 1905 ( online )
  • Peter Moor's drive to the southwest. Berlin 1906
  • The life of the Savior. Berlin 1907
  • Klaus Hinrich Baas. Berlin 1909
    • Klaus Hinrich Baas. The story of a self-made man ( online )
  • The downfall of Anna Hollmann. Berlin 1911
  • Sönke Erichsen Berlin 1913
  • Bismarck. Berlin 1914 ( online )
  • The Berlin Brothers 1917
  • Brooding. Berlin 1920
  • The pastor of Poggsee . Berlin 1921
  • Letters from America. Berlin 1923
  • Lütte Witt. Berlin 1924
  • Otto Babendiek. Berlin 1926
  • Seagulls and mice. Berlin 1927
  • The Barlete Chronicle. Cultural history of a village in Lower Saxony. Berlin 1928
  • Fool. Berlin 1929
  • The burning tree. Berlin 1931
  • Meino the braggart. Berlin 1933
  • Geert Bruges. Munich 1934 and Berlin 1935
  • The widow of Husum. Berlin 1935
  • The Faith of the Nordmark. Stuttgart 1936
  • Foreshore. Berlin 1937
  • Land on the North Sea. Leipzig 1938
  • Life story. Berlin 1940
  • Life science. Berlin 1942
  • The bailiff of Sylt. Berlin 1943

literature

  • Karl Ludwig Kohlwage : Commentary on the special issue “The Northern Mark in the Battle of Faith” , in: Kohlwage, Kamper, Pörksen (ed.): “You will be my witnesses!” Voices for the preservation of a denominational church in urgent times. The Breklumer Hefte of the ev.-luth. Confessional community in Schleswig-Holstein from 1935 to 1941. Sources on the history of the church struggle in Schleswig-Holstein . Compiled and edited by Peter Godzik , Husum: Matthiesen Verlag 2018, p. 474 f.
  • Gregor Brand:  Gustav Frenssen. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 22, Bautz, Nordhausen 2003, ISBN 3-88309-133-2 , Sp. 350-375.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  • Andreas Crystall: Gustav Frenssen. His way from cultural Protestantism to National Socialism. Kaiser, Gütersloher Verlag-Haus, Gütersloh 2002, ISBN 3-579-02609-7 .
  • Kay Dohnke, Dietrich Stein (ed.): Gustav Frenssen in his time. From mass literature in the German Empire to mass ideology in the Nazi state. Boyens, Heide 1997, ISBN 3-8042-0750-2 . Contains u. a. a bibliography of Frenssen's publications from the pen of Kay Dohnke.
  • Volker Griese : The three lives of Gustav F. A Frenssen chronicle. MV-Verlag, Münster 2011, ISBN 978-3-86991-415-2
  • Otto Jordan (arr.): Gustav-Frenssen-Bibliography. Bohmstedt, 1978.
  • Olaf Klose :  Frenssen, Gustav. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 402 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Ulrich Klappstein: With the eyes of the well-bred literary man . In: Ulrich Klappstein / Heiko Thomsen (eds.): Tellingstedt & the way there . Neisse, Dresden 2016, pp. 329–371. ISBN 978-3-86276-185-2 .
  • Norbert Mecklenburg: Narrated Province. Regionalism and modernity in the novel. Athenaeum, Königstein / Taunus 1982, ISBN 3-7610-8248-7 .
  • Hans Sarkowicz , Alf Mentzer: Literature in Nazi Germany. A biographical lexicon. Europa Verlag, Hamburg / Vienna (adult new edition) 2002, ISBN 3-203-82030-7
  • Arno Schmidt: An unfinished business. On the 100th birthday of Gustav Frenssen. In: the same: The knights of the spirit. From forgotten colleagues. Stahlberg, Karlsruhe 1965. pp. 90-165.
  • Jan Süselbeck : "Ass = tillery + Säcksualität". Arno Schmidt's argument with Gustav Frenssen. Aisthesis, Bielefeld 2001, ISBN 3-89528-337-1
  • Klaus Uhde: Gustav Frenssen's literary career up to the First World War. A critical monographic study on the development of ethnic literature. Munich: Univ. Diss. 1983.
  • Johannes Lorentzen (Ed.): The North Mark in the Faith Struggle. An answer from the Church to Gustav Frenssen , Breklum: Missionsbuchhandlung undated (1936); reprinted in: Kohlwage, Kamper, Pörksen (ed.): “You will be my witnesses!” Voices for the preservation of a denominational church in urgent times. The Breklumer Hefte of the ev.-luth. Confessional community in Schleswig-Holstein from 1935 to 1941. Sources on the history of the church struggle in Schleswig-Holstein . Compiled and edited by Peter Godzik, Husum: Matthiesen Verlag 2018, p. 169 ff.
    • Otto Dibelius : Frenssen's Farewell to Christianity , p. 170 ff.
    • Johannes Tonnesen : The changeability of Gustav Frenssen , p. 175 ff.
    • Johannes Lorentzen: Gustav Frenssen's Christ picture , p. 182 ff.
    • Wolfgang Miether: Frenssen's message of God , p. 188 ff.
    • Hans Dunker: The vagueness of the pagan faith - The clarity of the Christian faith , p. 193 ff.
    • Hans Treplin: Notes on the first psalm , p. 197 ff.
    • Käthe Tonnesen: To Gustav Frenssen. The word of a mother from the Nordmark , p. 204 ff.
    • Heinrich Voss: About the youth of the Nordmark. Word of a teacher , p. 210 f.
    • Johannes Tramsen : Frenssen's judgment on the Church of the Nordmark and its pastors , p. 211 ff.
    • Martin Pörksen : Only dying Christian communities in the Nordmark? , P. 216 ff.
    • Johannes Drews: The pastor in Hemme writes , p. 225
    • Johannes Tonnesen: What the North Says! , P. 226 ff.
    • Paul Gerhard Johanssen : How will things continue? , P. 231 ff.
  • Hans Treplin: Gustav Frenssen declares war on Christianity in Nordmark , in: ders .: Around the cross and the altar. A word from Schleswig-Holstein on the 5th main part , Breklum: Self-published by the Office for People's Mission 1936, p. 16 ff .; reprinted in: Kohlwage, Kamper, Pörksen (ed.): “You will be my witnesses!” Voices for the preservation of a denominational church in urgent times. The Breklumer Hefte of the ev.-luth. Confessional community in Schleswig-Holstein from 1935 to 1941. Sources on the history of the church struggle in Schleswig-Holstein . Compiled and edited by Peter Godzik, Husum: Matthiesen Verlag 2018, p. 161 ff.
  • Franz Brümmer : Frenssen, Gustav . In: Brümmers Lexicon of German poets and prose writers . 6th edition Reclam, Leipzig 1913.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ According to Arno Schmidt: An unfinished business - on the 100th birthday of Gustav Frenssen. In The Knights Of The Spirit - From Forgotten Colleagues, Karlsruhe 1965, pp. 137f.
  2. ↑ “It's a shame! This most distinguished head in Germany - one saw it very clearly from the outside; there weren't three such skulls in Europe - shattered by the narrowest and most petrified brains in the country. “, Gustav Frenssen: Letters from America . Berlin 1923, p. 81; quoted from: Andreas Crystall: Gustav Frenssen. His way from cultural Protestantism to National Socialism. Gütersloh 2002, p. 337.
  3. ↑ Hans Sarkowicz, Alf Mentzer: Literature in Nazi Germany. A biographical lexicon. Hamburg 2002, p. 171
  4. ↑ a b Ulrich Pfeil: From the Empire to the “Third Reich”: Heide 1890–1933. Self-published by Heide 1997. At the same time, Hamburg university dissertation 1995/96.
  5. ↑ Hans Sarkowicz, Alf Mentzer: Literature in Nazi Germany. A biographical lexicon. Hamburg 2002, p. 170 f.
  6. ↑ Uwe Danker , Astrid Schwabe: Schleswig-Holstein and the National Socialism, Neumünster 2005, page 88.
  7. ↑ On the other hand, the special edition published by Pastor Johannes Lorentzen , Kiel, turned in the series of Breklumer Hefte : Die Nordmark im Glaubenskampf. The Church's answer to Gustav Frenssen . Heinz Eduard Tödt wrote about it in his autobiography Wagnis und Fügung in 2012: “For the training in the Hitler Youth and Jungvolk - I mean it was in 1936 - a paper by Gustav Frenssen was distributed with the title 'Der Glaube der Nordmark'. Frenssen, pastor in Dithmarschen and known as a writer through several books, made the transition from Christian and church beliefs to folk beliefs in God - a step that must have been spectacular because of Frenssen's popularity. I did not pass on the booklet 'Glaube der Nordmark' in the area of ​​my young people. The ensign leaders of the tribe, including Ernst Appenfeller in Tönning, and also my friend Franz Dunker, the tribe leader in Husum, did not take part in this Germanic-godly training role . From her and from the pressure exerted on members of the SS and party functionaries to leave the church, I recognized that the conflict between National Socialism and Christianity was intensifying on the party's initiative ”(p. 58 f.).
  8. ↑ Florian Dunklau: "If he died, one worthless would be less." - Frenssen's "Diary of the Wittschild Office" (1923) . Annotated text excerpts online on pro-mann-strasse-heide.blogspot.de from January 15, 2014.
  9. ↑ polunbi.de
  10. ↑ polunbi.de
  11. ↑ polunbi.de
  12. ↑ polunbi.de
  13. ↑ Arno Schmidt: An unfinished business - for Gustav Frenssen's centenary birthday. In: Die Ritter Vom Geist - From forgotten colleagues. Karlsruhe 1965, p. 90 to p. 166.
  14. ↑ Arno Schmidt: An unfinished business - for Gustav Frenssen's centenary birthday. In: Die Ritter Vom Geist - From forgotten colleagues. Karlsruhe 1965, p. 137 f.
  15. ↑ Kay Dohnke: Völkische Literatur and Heimatliteratur 1870-1918 . In: Uwe Puschner, Walter Schmitz, Justus H. Ulbricht (eds.): Handbook on the “Völkische Movement” 1871–1918 . Munich 1999, pp. 651-686, here: p. 678.
  16. ↑ Florian Dunklau: Heider SPD: " Renaming Frenssen Street" (1983) . . Dithmarscher Landeszeitung from May 10, 1983. Online at pro-mann-strasse-heide.blogspot.de from March 27, 2013.
  17. ↑ There the street named after Frenssen in 1928 was renamed Anne-Frank-Straße in 1986: The streets of the strong women in the Hanseatic city . In: Hamburger Abendblatt , August 11, 2011.
  18. ^ Dietrich Stein: Bad Oldesloe and Gustav Frenssen . In: Information on contemporary history in Schleswig-Holstein. Issue 36, Kiel 1999, pp. 102-104.
  19. ↑ Hans-G. Hilscher, Dietrich Bleihöfer: Ringelnatzstrasse (formerly Frenssenstrasse). In: Kiel Street Lexicon. Continued since 2005 by the Office for Building Regulations, Surveying and Geoinformation of the State Capital Kiel, as of February 2017 ( kiel.de ).
    Hans-G. Hilscher, Dietrich Bleihöfer: Gudegastkoppel (formerly Frenssenstrasse 2/4). In: Kiel Street Lexicon. Continued since 2005 by the Office for Building Regulations, Surveying and Geoinformation of the State Capital Kiel, as of February 2017 ( kiel.de ).
  20. ↑ Online edition of the Dithmarscher Landeszeitung ( memento from April 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) from April 8, 2014
  21. ↑ Online edition of the Dithmarscher Landeszeitung ( memento from April 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) from April 10, 2014
  22. ↑ Great front against renaming. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on October 3, 2015 ; accessed on October 2, 2015 .
  23. ↑ New street name. In: www.meldorf-nordsee.de. Retrieved October 2, 2015 .
  24. ↑ Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of October 2, 2015, p. 18
  25. ↑ These ten streets are to be renamed in: Online edition of Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of October 2, 2015, accessed on October 3, 2015
  26. ↑ Biogram Wolfgang Miether (online at geschichte-bk-sh.de)
  27. ↑ Biogram Hans Dunker (online at d-nb.info)
  28. ↑ Biogram Hans Treplin (online at geschichte-bk-sh.de)
  29. ↑ Biogram Käthe Tonnesen, b. Sohrt (online at ronlev.dk)
personal data
SURNAME Frenssen, Gustav
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer
DATE OF BIRTH October 19, 1863
PLACE OF BIRTH Barlt , Dithmarschen
DATE OF DEATH April 11, 1945
Place of death Barlt , Dithmarschen