Johannes Kähn

Johannes Kähn (born February 1, 1810 in Baldingen , Nördlingen , † July 25, 1874 Baldingen) was a German veterinarian and poet. He was a district veterinarian in the Swabian city of Nördlingen and a poet in the Giant Swabian dialect .

Life

Kähn was the third son and one of seven children of the village blacksmith J. Georg Kähn. In order to ensure a flawless career in the military, his father sent him to the Nördlingen Latin school . Here he made friends with the later poet and philosopher Melchior Meyr , among others . Shortly after successfully completing the veterinary school he then attended , Johannes Kähn lost almost all of his eyesight due to a leaf infection.

After his eldest brother, who was supposed to take over the father's small forge, found a job as an escadron blacksmith in Ansbach and the second brother, Adam Kähn, came to the "Zum golden Roß" brewery in Augsburg (today's Riegele brewery , whose later owner he became), the father unceremoniously hired Johannes, who had now become unfit for the military, into his business.

Long before that - that is, around the 1840s - Johannes Kähn gained experience in poetry. His oldest surviving poem is from January 1, 1830, a rhymed New Year's epistle that was intended for his parents.

“Put
your trust in God, we complain
about our quiet distress, - And hold on to Him in joy, make
us happy - -

And God will guide me to my goal!
It is the greatest reward for me
when my parents say:
We have a good son. "

However, he did not have much opportunity for poetry; For more than twenty years he waited in vain for a job as a veterinarian and instead, hastily and gratefully, helped his father in the forge. His lyrical work was limited to smaller verse pistles that he wrote as thanks for friends or on certain occasions. Nevertheless, there were occasional situations in which he could find enough leisure to write - for example on the way to his eldest brother, whom he paid a visit when he was already working as an escadron blacksmith. This is where one of the poems was written that was most valued in his time, namely The Big Ox :

“I Wirtshaus z'Dörfling am a mol
I at da Baura gweſa,
Dia hont ſe
enthalta guat, But wouldn’t be with leſa.

Because d'Karta ſind her liabſtes Buach,
Des leſes without nöata,
Often d’r pastor itz ooh over there,
Tuat with a weng laweata.

But ſellmols ſind ſia even amused,
Teant eagerly diſchgarira,
And i ſitz do, and höar so zua,
Des tuat ſia net ſchenira.

Thou talk about allerloi,
Of guat 'and böaſa Sacha,
And huir git's again Koara gnuag,
Thou lets ſe ällas macha.

Nor the police and iſcht'n z'noon,
the can net v'rſchnaufa,
A farmer, moines, but oh
as much as d'Heara ſaufa.

But oiner ſ says: 'O loß halt ſeĩ,
Des loß i mi net quäla,
Since Heara was ebba _n oh,
What õs hont, sometimes wrong.

I am only happy with my Och a iaz,
Do kã mi nex betrüabã,
Dia ſind would be fcht ſo great
Wia do d'r Nuibaur drübã. ‛

Do ſtot d'r Nuibaur up and ſ says:
'I lie and fear' your sin;
An gröaß'ra Ochſa no, as mi,
Kãſt in the world net finda. ‛"

Johannes Kähn renewed his relationship with Melchior Meyr in the 1850s. He did this not least because he hoped that his old, now well-known friend would give him a chance to get a little more attention outside of the Nördlinger Ries , which he did not succeed. Meyr was by no means averse to his poetry, as can be seen from his article in the Augsburger Abendzeitung :

“Poems in Rieser Mundart” have been published in Nördlingen near Beck, which are recommendable in more than one respect. […] If Grübel is called a conscious Nuremberg Philistine by Goethe, Kähn can probably be called a conscious Rieser farmer, a village child who through his education has only become all the more open to the peculiar life and thinking of the rural people. [...] A Swabian part of the people, which has already been drawn in stories, is so jokingly and seriously characterized that the poems are significant and genuine even in their limits [...]. "

For the last years of his life, however, he was fortunate enough to be able to work as a district vet in Nördlingen. In this last phase of life he increasingly turned his back on his old passion. In 1872, on the occasion of an annual festival of the Nördlinger Workers' Association , he was to write one last poem:

Good progress. To the workers' association in Nördlingen at ſan annual feast 1872. (1st and 2nd stanza )

“Schõ Viel hont meĩ poems ghöart,
Vom Friedafeſt im Ries,
And that oh some gfalla hot,
Dẽs där globa gwieß.
It icht älles ſo
miscounted Wias gweſa iſcht afs Hor,
So that everyone must ſaga,
Yes d Jas iſcht älhr.

And ſchtimma drum gwiß oh
Meim Wõſch from Hearza,
That oſer Schtreba further oh
A good progress chrit [t] ſei,
A progress in the beſchtã Weis,
In the right respect and sense,
Because nor ãotter bringa kã
In Leba reicha Gwinn. "

On July 25, 1874, Johannes Kähn died after a month's illness in his small blacksmith's shop in Baldingen.

useful information

Johannes-Kähn-Straße in Nördlingen and Johannes-Kähn-Weg in Baldingen are named after him.

literature

• Johannes Kähn: Poems and sayings in Rieser dialect. 4th edition. Beck, Nördlingen 1921.
  • therein: Tobias Ruf: Character traits of Johannes Kähn's view of life. P. 92 ff.

Web links

Wikisource: Johannes Kähn  - Sources and full texts

• Johannes Kähn in the Bavarian literature portal (project of the Bavarian State Library )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Johannes Kähn: From the foreword to the second edition. In: Johannes Kähn: Poems and sayings in Rieser dialect. Noerdlingen, 1921 ⁴ .