Johann Gottfried Richter (journalist)

Johann Gottfried Richter (born November 26, 1763 Taucha near Leipzig ; † June 5, 1829 Eilenburg ) was a German journalist and translator .

Life

Johann Gottfried Richter attended the St. Thomas School in Leipzig . He then studied theology at the University of Leipzig from 1786 without completing this educational path, since he went to Moscow at the end of 1787 to work as a tutor for a respected family . He soon mastered the Russian language very well. It is said that he completed his studies at Lomonosov University in Moscow . His literary inclinations brought him into contact with publishers and authors, especially Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamsin , who was a leading exponent of Russian sentimentalism . In 1803 he returned to Germany after 16 years in Russia and in the same year, at the intercession of Karamsin , he became a Saxon-Weimar court counselor to Duke Karl August and an imperial Russian councilor. In 1808 he took up his new residence in Eilenburg, where he spent the last two decades of his life. Here he worked as a private scholar and translator.

Richter was an important mediator of Russian cultural achievements. He provided a description of the city of Moscow and, in collaboration with the illustrator Christian Gottfried Heinrich Geißler, described Russian customs ( manners, customs and clothing of the Russians from the lower classes , 2 volumes, Leipzig 1805; games and amusements of the Russians from the lower classes , Leipzig 1805). He also translated Karamsin's works such as Letters from a Traveling Russian (1799–1802) and Russian knight tales. Together with the Riga publisher Johann Friedrich Hartknoch the Younger, he published the magazine Russische Miszellen (3 vols., Leipzig 1803-04). In this sheet, western Europeans received more precise information than was previously available about the way of life of the Russians, about the history and regional studies of the Tsarist Empire and about the Russian expression of the literary tendency of sentimentalism. The magazine also contained the first German translation of the Igor song . In the vivid description of the Tsarist Empire, Richter hinted at great benevolence for the Russians. The prevailing idea in Western Europe that the Russians are cultured, Richter vigorously tried to refute.

literature

• Hans-Joachim Böttcher : "Richter, Johann Gottfried", in: Important historical personalities of the Düben Heath, AMF - No. 237. 2012, p. 84.

Web links

• Erhard Hexelschneider: Richter, Johann Gottfried . In: Institute for Saxon History and Folklore (Ed.): Saxon Biography .