Henrik Hertz

Henrik heart

Heyman Henrik Hertz (born August 25, 1798 in Copenhagen , † February 25, 1870 there ) was a Danish writer .

Life

The family came from the educated Jewish bourgeoisie in Denmark. The father, Philip Hertz, was first a merchant, then a master baker. He died when Henrik was 1½ years old. After his death, his mother, Beline Hertz, née Salomonsen, took over the bakery in Klosterstræde. In 1807 the bakery was destroyed in the bombing of Copenhagen by a large fire in the entire district of the city and with it the happy childhood of Henrik Hertz, which was only overshadowed once by an almost fatal operation in the fourth year of life, where lumps on the neck were had formed. 1814, the second fatality overtook him with the death of his mother, of him at the age of 17 years orphans made.

Up to this point, Henrik had been reading novels and was already familiar with the most important German and Danish literary works. His brother Solomon Sylvester Hertz (born 1792), the second eldest son of the family, later editor of the well-known Vejle Amtsavis, had a gift for poetry and was just finishing his master's degree in philosophy (1809). In preparation for the metropolitan cities in Copenhagen, an upper middle class elementary school, he kept bringing his younger brother literature with him. “ As far as I can remember, ” wrote Hertz in his autobiographical manuscript Gjenganger-Breve , which he published anonymously in 1870. “ From the age of 11, I thought it was a done deal for me to write verses. So my brother once gave me an assignment in Danish, to which I answered with a little comedy interspersed with songs. “When Henrik was 13 he started high school and when his mother died it was questionable whether he could even go to college as an orphan. In the editor of Berlingske Tidende, ML Nathanson , he found a sponsor who enabled him to study law, which he graduated with flying colors in 1817.

Henrik Hertz was an avid fan of Adam Oehlenschläger , met Oehlenschläger's literary archenemy, the Danish poet Jens Immanuel Baggesen (1764–1826) and was a good friend of Johan Ludvig Heiberg and his wife. In his autobiography Gjenganger-Breve , in which, by the way , he takes a critical view of the fairy tale poet Hans Christian Andersen , he confessed to Johan Ludvig Heiberg and his school. His early poems were influenced by Bernhard Severin Ingemann , later Adam Oehlenschläger. He adored Svend Grundtvig , Adolph Wilhelm Schack von Staffeldt and admired William Shakespeare .

The dramas and comedies by Henrik Hertz were very successful and are considered to be pioneers for bourgeois realism in Denmark.

Henrik Hertz received the title of Professor in 1845, was made Knight of Dannebrog in 1850 and Dannebrogsmand in 1865. He was one of the four poets (alongside Hans Christian Andersen , Christian Winther and Frederik Paludan-Müller ) who were the first to receive a poet's fee from the Reichstag.

At the age of 52 (1850) he married Louise von Halle, the daughter of the trader Amsel von Halle and Sara born. Nathanso, and lived with her for another 20 successful years as a writer and author.

On February 25, 1870, he was buried in the Assinstens cemetery.

Works

• Henrik Hertz's Samlede Scrifter . (1. 1854 - 18. 1873)
• Udvalgte dramatiske Værker . (1.1897 - 8.1898)

reception

• Opera by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky : Jolanthe op.69 - Opera in one act after Hertz ' Kong Renés Datter ( King René's daughter ), 1891, libretto: Modest Tchaikovsky, world premiere: St. Petersburg 1892
• Fairy tale film: The Light of Love , a literary film adaptation from the GDR from 1990 with Eva Vejmělková as Reglindis-Jolanthe - a fairy tale based on Henrik Hertz ' Kong Renés Datter

literature

• Hans Kyrre: Henrik Hertz . - Copenhagen, Hagerup, 1916
• Brøndsted, Mogens: Henrik Hertzes teater . - Copenhagen, Munksgaards Forlag 1946

Web links

• Article in Arkiv for Dansk Litteratur (ADL) as pdf
• Article in Arkiv for Dansk Litteratur (ADL) as html
• Literature by and about Henrik Hertz in the catalog of the German National Library