Johannes Jørgensen
Johannes Jørgensen (born November 6, 1866 in Svendborg ; † May 29, 1956 there ) was a Danish poet and writer. He gained international fame primarily through his biographical depictions of Saint Francis of Assisi (1907), Catherine of Siena (1915) and Birgitta of Sweden (1946). Another major work is his autobiography Mit Livs Legende ("The Legend of My Life"), which has even been translated into Japanese.
Life
Growing up in Svendborg on Fyn as the son of a captain, Jørgensen left his hometown at the age of 16 to do his Abitur and study in Copenhagen . It was here that his first poetic attempts were made. At the same time, he encountered Danish cultural radicalism , a trend that is critical of religion , morality and society , primarily supported by artists and intellectuals . However, their monism did not satisfy him, and he turned to symbolism . With like-minded people he published the magazine Tårnet ("The Tower") in 1893/94, in which he, often in a polemical tone, represented an idealistic worldview. He received rejection and ridicule from intellectual spokesmen, especially Georg and Edvard Brandes . He received a grant from the Danish Ministry of Education for a study trip to Germany, Italy and France.
New encounters, including the one with the painter monk and convert Willibrord Verkade , whom he visited in the Beuron Archabbey in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, in 1894 , and with the Jew Mogens Ballin , who had converted to Catholicism , triggered an intellectual crisis. Jørgensen spent three months with Ballin in Assisi in 1894 . The figure of St. Francis did not let go of him afterwards. In 1896 Jørgensen was accepted into the Catholic Church .
Since then he turned increasingly to religious topics as a writer. His biography of Francis from 1907 has been translated into many languages and earned him honorary citizenship of Assisi and later that of his native Svendborg. In 1913/14 he filled a professorship for aesthetics in Leuven . He took up residence in Assisi in 1915 after separating from his wife Amalie Ewald and their seven children in 1913 . In 1937, two years after Amalie's death, he married the Austrian Helena Klein .
The time in Assisi from 1938 to 1947, during the Second World War , was interrupted by a stay in Vadstena, Sweden, at the monastery of St. Birgitta , whose biography he is now writing.
Jørgensen had personal friendships with writers such as Paul Verlaine , Léon Bloy and Stéphane Mallarmé . As a translator into the Danish language as well as from Danish, he earned the reputation of an “ambassador of world literature”. For years he had a weekly column in Copenhagen's Berlingske Tidende .
At the age of 86, Johannes Jørgensen moved from Assisi back to Svendborg in 1952, where he was buried in the city cemetery.
Aftermath
Despite the success of his biographies of saints abroad and the recognized power of speech, especially his descriptions of nature and travel, Jørgensen was only known to small circles in Denmark. The Danish Højskolesangbogen , a collection of exemplary poems in Danish literature, contains only one text by him.
Works
- 1894: Bekendelse
- 1900: Vor Frue af Danmark (novels)
- 1904: poetry. Udvalgte Ungdomsdigte (1885-1896) , Nordisk Forlag, København 1904
- 1907: The most yndigste rose
- 1907: The bright Frans af Assisi (biography)
- 1916-19: With Livs Legende (autobiography in 6 vol.)
- 1943: Digte i Danmark
literature
- Visit to Johannes Jörgensen . In: Die Zeit , No. 16/1953
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Visit to Johannes Jörgensen . In: Die Zeit , No. 16/1953
- ↑ a b c d e biography johannesjorgensenselskabet.dk
- ↑ Willibrord Verkade: The drive to perfection . Herder Verlag, Freiburg, 1932, pp. 20-25
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Jørgensen, Johannes |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Danish poet and writer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 6, 1866 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Svendborg |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 29, 1956 |
| Place of death | Svendborg |