Johann Matthias Dreyer

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Johann Matthias Dreyer (born February 16, 1717 in Hamburg ; † June 20, 1769 ibid) was a German writer , journalist and diplomatic agent.

Live and act

Johann Matthias Dreyer was born in Hamburg as the son of a wealthy businessman. His father, named Johann Martin Dreyer, was married to Helene Sabina, née (von) Bachmair. Dreyer, who was considered small, overgrown and slender as a young man, graduated from the Johanneum School for Scholars in November 1732 and then went to the University of Leipzig . He neglected the chosen subject of law in favor of the fine sciences . After completing his studies without a degree, he lived in Berlin from 1741 to 1745, where he befriended Jacob Friedrich Lamprecht, with whose support he tried to get a job at the court of Friedrich II , which he did not succeed. He then worked as Christian Ludwig II's secretary , traveled to England and returned to his hometown, where he worked as a journalist and writer.

In January 1753 Dreyer took over a position as dispatch secretary to Georg Ludwig von Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf and was appointed diplomatic agent of Bishop Friedrich Augusts . These activities, based in Hamburg, improved Dreyer's previously precarious financial situation. During his service time he wrote regular reports which he sent to his superior Matthias Andreas Alardus in Eutin and which give a complex impression of the conditions in Hamburg at that time. In 1756 he became friends with Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock , but found few words of praise for his work. In the same year he made the acquaintance of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing , whom he greatly admired.

Due to his publications, in which he criticized the main pastor Johann Melchior Goeze , who was known as an opponent of the Enlightenment , Dreyer repeatedly got into conflict. On October 30, 1761, the City Council of Hamburg criticized Dreyer's writings as blasphemous, but did not explicitly name Dreyers as the author. The council imposed a distribution ban and announced fines and imprisonment for further publications. In 1763 there was a complaint against Dreyer as the alleged author of the writings, but this remained without consequences. In the same year Dreyer published anynom Schöne Spielwerke beym Wein, Punsch, Bischof, and Krambambuli in Hamburg . There were 216 sayings and toasts that Dreyer had not written alone and that met with great national approval. Johann Melchior Goeze then intervened with the City Council of Hamburg. Among other things, he took offense at the verse "Drink here as much as you can, do what the meat tells you; / There you have no thirst, there you are pure spirit." The Hamburg council then decided on September 14, 1763 that an executioner should tear up the writing. The remains of the collection were to be set on fire on the so-called "dishonorable block". The council took into account Georg Ludwig von Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf, who had protected Dreyer as his employee and also his activities as author and editor, and only made the decision after von Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf had died.

After the city council of Hamburg had expelled Dreyer on September 16, 1763, he went to Holstein, where he worked as a secretary in Kiel and Eutin. He asked several times to be allowed to return to Hamburg, but was not heard. After Caspar von Saldern stood up for him, Dreyer was able to return to his hometown in 1766. He agreed not to publish any further, which he did not adhere to. Instead, he wrote satirical texts for which he was immediately criticized. The contributions appeared in the moral weekly Beytrag zum Desserts , whose editor Dreyer was from November 1766 to May 1767.

Johann Matthias Dreyer was married to Anna Cecilia, nee Meese. They had a daughter who was 17 years old in 1769. Dreyer died after a long illness in June 1769. The burial took place in a hereditary funeral in the main church Sankt Katharinen , which his friend Albert Wittenberg had made available.

Works

Johann Matthias Dreyer wrote numerous poems from 1740, which he dedicated to one-off occasions and with which he tried to improve his meager income. He also translated and published several pieces that were performed on stages and for which he sometimes wrote his own forewords. Several of his poems can be found in Georg Philipp Telemann's song cycle 24, partly serious, partly joking odes . From 1748 to 1759 Dreyer was editor of the weekly New Contributions to the Pleasure of the Mind and Joke (Bremen Contributions) . Dreyers wrote for many weekly and monthly published works. This included the poetic thoughts of political and scholarly news that were published by Wilhelm Adolf Paulli and with whom Dreyer was friends.

Together with Georg Schade, who was the royal court attorney in Altona, Dreyer published state and scholar news in 1759 . Dreyer wrote his own poems for the newspaper, which appeared four times a week. Chief President Henning von Qualen reprimanded the poet because of the texts that praised sensual pleasures. After critical texts about the Duke of Richelieu appeared in the newspaper , a French agent in Copenhagen managed to have the newspaper shut down in October 1759. Dreyer did not abide by the ban, but from now on handwritten the newspaper together with Johann Christoph Brandes and sent it to several courtyards. This newspaper was also quickly banned.

In the following years Dreyer wrote regionally and nationally and got into many disputes because of his publications. His handwritten publications on Hamburg's politicians and personalities spread in Hamburg coffee shops and wine houses and were quickly reproduced. After his death, the widow Anna Cecilia published a collection of Dreyer's poems in 1771.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Beautiful toys at Wein, Punsch, Bischof, and Krambambuli, in Hamburg. Hamburg and Leipzig 1763 ( digitized version ), Bavarian State Library
personal data
SURNAME Dreyer, Johann Matthias
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer, journalist and diplomatic agent
DATE OF BIRTH February 16, 1717
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH June 20, 1769
Place of death Hamburg