Herbert Kranz

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Herbert Karl Ludwig Kranz (born October 4, 1891 in Nordhausen , † August 30, 1973 in Braunschweig ) was a German writer .

Life

After graduating from high school in 1910 at the Städtisches Reform-Realgymnasium in Berlin-Wilmersdorf , he studied German , philosophy and history in Berlin and Leipzig . With the beginning of the First World War he volunteered, but two years later because of illness he was appointed lieutenant. R. dismissed. Then he married Ulrike Reck. After he started working as a research assistant at the youth welfare office in 1918, he took on several positions in the field of literature in addition to his own literary work with various publications. He worked as a director at the theater in Düsseldorf in 1920 and in the Netherlands in 1923 . From 1925 he worked first as a freelancer, then as an editor at the Rhein-Mainischen-Volkszeitung in Frankfurt am Main , which belonged to the Herder publishing group , and from 1927 produced the children's newspaper Weg in die Welt as its supplement . 1930–1933 he was professor of German at the Pädagogische Akademie Halle (Saale) in teacher training without even having a teacher exam.

After Hitler came to power in 1933, he was dismissed from the university because of his liberal attitude. He found a job as a local editor at the Frankfurter Zeitung and, at the same time, at the Illustrierte Blatt . At the same time he worked as a freelance writer . In 1941 he wrote the book Behind the Scenes, an anti-Semitic pamphlet about French politics from 1933 to 1940. In 1943 the Frankfurter Zeitung was discontinued and he was banned from his profession by the Reich Association of the German Press because of his drama Der Ritt mit dem Henker because of political unreliability , whereupon the magazine dismissed him. However, his book testimony of the times was recommended by Alfred Rosenberg's "Hauptamtschrifttum" for Nazi libraries.

After the war he lived as a freelance writer in Vachendorf , Stuttgart , Gebersheim and from 1970 in Königstein im Taunus . Herbert Kranz died in 1973 while visiting the family of his son Peter (* 1919) in Braunschweig. Seven years later, his wife Ulrike, née Reck, who had accompanied him on several journeys for research, died.

Works

Ubique Terrarum novels

Herbert Kranz celebrated his greatest literary successes in the field of children's and youth literature. At the age of 60 he started his most successful novel cycle around the fictional society Ubique Terrarum . This 10-volume series describes the adventures and experiences of a group of six men (an Englishman named Stephen Slanton - the chef, an Irish named Patrick Cromby - plum pudding, two French: first Cyprian Bombardon - as a lamprey cook, second Gaston von Montfort, knight of honor of the Sovereign Order of Malta and Count von Darifant - the Count, two Germans, namely Dr. Peter Geist - called GG, the Great Spirit (inspired in many ways by the Halle pedagogue Adolf Reichwein ) and his friend Bertram Kunke, as a 'figure' and off Volume 6 instead of the young Indian Tschandru-Singh). The stories take place in Afghanistan , Brazil , the USA , a Caribbean island, Greenland , Malaysia , Sardinia , Morocco , Lebanon and southern France . It was important to Kranz that his main character was not an omnipotent hero, but a team in which the skills and inadequacies of the individuals compensated for each other.

The team is sent on expeditions all over the world, sometimes to search for mineral resources, but more often to help people in need. In the first volume of the series, the first assignment of the men is described, who only realize in many conflicts that they can trust each other unconditionally. The series ends because the men leave Ubique Terrarum to help the rajah of a Malay state establish the administration of their country after independence.

The novels were written between 1953 and 1958 and were all published for the first time by Herder in Freiburg . All novels contain an alphabetical appendix for the countries, places, people and expressions described, which was not common in youth literature at the time . His grandson Georg Kranz reissued the series from 2004 to 2010 as paperbacks with an updated glossary.

Children's books

  • Schnucki-Has and Miesemau , 1929
  • Full throttle (under the pseudonym Peng), 1929
  • Lampes weekend (pseudonym: Peng), 1930
  • The love animals , 1934
  • With the Easter Bunnies , 1934
  • Kasper comes to court , 1934
  • Bunny Klein walked alone ... , verses 1935
  • Hänschen Didelhaenschen! , Nursery Rhymes 1935
  • That's how we drive , 1937
  • The great car ride , 1938
  • Putzi , 1938
  • From Mutz and Stropp and the Häslein Hopp-Hopp , 1938
  • The birthday verses , 1939

Historical stories

This includes u. a. the series "The Voice of the Past" (1960–1964), also published by Herder in Freiburg. A historical personality is the main character of each book.

"Risk and Adventure" series

Classic international novels in free retelling for the youth

More works on historical subjects

  • The young king
  • Old Fritz
  • Bismarck and the kingdom without a crown, Franckh Stuttgart 1960
  • Black and white red and black red gold, Franckh Stuttgart 1961
  • The end of the empire, Franckh Stuttgart 1961
  • The book from the German East
  • The savior of the tribe
  • The treasure trove
  • The angel writes it down
  • Newspaper radio and television
  • Behind the Scenes of the Cabinets and General Staffs - A French Contemporary and Moral History 1933–1940

Plays

  • The perfectly healthy sick , (based on the play The imagined sick ), under the pseudonym Peter Pflug
  • The Ride with the Executioner Play in three acts, Wiking Verlag, 1943

Translations

  • from Dutch: Paul Biegel : I really want to be different . Free Spiritual Life Publishing House, Stuttgart 2014, ISBN 978-3-8251-7807-9 . First edition by Herder, Freiburg 1969.

literature

  • Winfred Kaminski: Heroic inwardness. Studies on youth literature before and after 1945. dipa-Verl., Frankfurt am Main 1987. (= Youth and Media; 14) ISBN 3-7638-0127-8
  • Ulrich Otto: In the footsteps of "Ubique Terrarum". Investigations into the youth book series "Ubique Terrarum" by Herbert Kranz. Kern-Verlag, Regensburg 2003. ISBN 978-3-934983-04-5

Web links

supporting documents

  1. ↑ biography. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
  2. ↑ Kräm - Marp . In: Wilhelm Kühlmann (Hrsg.): Killy Literature Lexicon: Authors and works from the German-speaking cultural area . 2nd Edition. tape 7 . Walter de Gruyter, 2010, ISBN 978-3-11-022049-0 , p. 15–16 (714 p., Limited preview in Google Book search).
  3. ↑ Seven hundred books for National Socialist libraries compiled by the main office of literature, central publishing house of the NSDAP., Franz Eher Nachf. Munich, 1944.
  4. ↑ http://www.ubique-terrarum.net/
personal data
SURNAME Kranz, Herbert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kranz, Herbert Karl Ludwig (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer
DATE OF BIRTH October 4, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Nordhausen
DATE OF DEATH August 30, 1973
Place of death Braunschweig