Karl Grün (journalist)

Karl Theodor Ferdinand Grün (born September 30, 1817 in Lüdenscheid , † February 18, 1887 in Vienna ; pseudonym: Ernst von der Haide ) was a German journalist , philosopher and left-wing democratic politician . Because of his radical ideas he was persecuted by the Prussian government and from 1844 lived mostly abroad. In Paris he came into close contact with the early socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon . After the outbreak of the revolution in 1848/49, Grün temporarily returned to Germany. He was elected to the Prussian National Assembly, where he joined the extreme left. He was eventually charged with "intellectual" involvement in the Prüm arsenal storm, but acquitted after eight months in prison. It was not until 1861 that he was able to return to Germany, where he lived as a journalist, professor and lecturer. Grün last lived in Vienna and edited Ludwig Feuerbach's estate .

Karl Green

education

Grün was the son of an elementary school teacher. One of his brothers was Albert Grün . After primary school in his hometown, he attended grammar school in Wetzlar . During this time he began to participate in a weekly newspaper published by students and to deal with contemporary authors. After graduating from high school, Grün studied philology and Protestant theology in Bonn from 1835 . There he first met Karl Marx . In 1838 he moved to Berlin and now studied philology and philosophy . There he was influenced by the Young Hegelians . Together with Marx, Grün possibly belonged to the left Hegelian discussion circles. In Berlin, Grün received his doctorate as Dr. phil.

At the end of his studies, Grün published the book of migrations in the Baltic Sea and Rhine. (Published 1839) In this, he processed his travel experiences from the semester break. Several central elements of his work are already evident in this book. This includes dealing with politics and social issues as well as philosophy and art history. He dedicated the book to Karl Gutzkow and confessed to belonging to the liberal, national and socially oriented opposition in Germany.

Pre-March opposition

Grün evaded military service in 1838 by fleeing to Alsace, France . He had to give up hope of an academic career in Germany. In Colmar he worked as a high school professor. He also worked for various newspapers in Germany. In 1842 he returned to Germany and worked for the radical and later banned Mannheimer Abendzeitung . The events surrounding the ban on the leaf made Grün a well-known person in the pre-March opposition movement. His attempt to do his habilitation in Marburg failed due to the contradiction of the university. In 1842 he was classified and expelled as a criminal because of his critical press articles.

The move led to a radicalization of his views for Grün. He first went to Mainz and was celebrated as a political hero. He wrote for numerous newspapers, including from Hamburg , Mannheim , Würzburg and the Rheinische Zeitung from Cologne . The Trierische Zeitung and the Kölnische Zeitung were added later.

From June 1843 Grün lived with his family in Cologne and had contact with the leading socialists living there. In addition to his journalistic work, he also gave literary and cultural-historical lectures. In the same year he took over the editing of the newspaper “ Der Sprecher or Rheinisch-Westfälischer Anzeiger ” from Wesel , but still lived in Cologne. As with the Mannheimer Abendzeitung and the Trierische Zeitung, his work led to a supraregional response. The speaker could only appear until the ban in 1844.

At the invitation of Otto Lüning , Grün went on a lecture tour to Westphalia in the winter of 1843/1844. He stayed several times with the industrialist and social reformer Julius Meyer . He also met Moses Hess . In Bielefeld , Grün founded the Bielefelder monthly magazine in 1844 , which was also banned shortly afterwards.

During this time he became one of the spokesmen for the "true socialism" in the Rhineland and Westphalia, so reviled by Karl Marx . It was based on Ludwig Feuerbach. He developed a theoretical program of a "science of society as science of socialization". The previous philosophy should be replaced by a philosophy of action.

First years of exile

When the ban on the newspaper in Trier seemed imminent, Grün went into exile. In Brussels he came into contact with Ferdinand Freiligrath . In Paris he became part of the radical émigré community. Since the Trierische Zeitung was not banned , Grün continued to write for the paper from Paris. After the Rheinische Zeitung was banned, this was one of the most important radical daily newspapers in the German Confederation . In Paris he also met Pierre Joseph Proudhon. He appreciated his work and translated it into German. This contact resulted in Grün's probably most important book, The Social Movements in France and Belgium (1845). This was sharply criticized by Karl Marx because it came very close to his ideas on many points. In 1845 Grün was one of the editors of the Blätter der Vernunft in Paris . He was expelled from Paris because of his contacts with communist circles. He had to move to Brussels, where financial difficulties forced him to work as a printer.

Revolution 1848/49

At the beginning of the revolution of 1848, Grün returned to Germany. He lived in Trier. Between 1848 and 1849 he was editor of the magazine "Amphitheater for entertainment, art and criticism." His hopes for a chair at a planned free university in Frankfurt am Main failed when the project was abandoned. In Trier, Grün held political lectures and was active in the Democratic Club . Green was elected to the Prussian National Assembly in a replacement election for the Wittlich district. There he was on the extreme left . In 1849 he was also a member of the second chamber of the Prussian state parliament . There he was one of the leaders of the left.

When the chamber was dissolved, Grün spoke at a large popular meeting on the Marienburg in May 1849 and called for countermeasures. The meeting then decided to storm the arsenal in Prüm . Grün was arrested after the failure of the Prüm Zeughaussturm and the end of the revolution. He was charged with intellectual involvement in the Prüm events. He was detained for eight months before being acquitted.

Second exile and return

After that, Grün lived in Brussels between 1850 and 1861. There he worked as a private tutor and planned to open a boarding school. He also gave lectures at the university in 1859. In his writings, he now turned against the regime of Napoleon III .

With the beginning of the New Era , he was able to return to Prussia in 1861 . He later traveled to Turin via Belgium and Paris . There he took part in the opening of the first national representation of Young Italy and also visited numerous other Italian cities. He returned to Brussels via various stations. In November 1861 he went on an extensive political lecture tour through Westphalia and the Rhineland .

From 1862 Grün lived in Frankfurt am Main, where he wrote for the Neue Frankfurter Zeitung . At the University of Commerce and Industry he became a professor, particularly for the history of literature . In addition, he continued to give lectures all over Germany. In 1865 he moved to Heidelberg . In the run-up to the war of 1866, Grün was involved in the anti-Prussian democratic people's party . He took part in the international congress of the Peace and Freedom League in Geneva in 1867 . From 1868 he was co-editor of the "Demokratischen Correspondenz."

Vienna

In 1868 Grün moved to Vienna. There he was editor of the letters and the estate of Ludwig Feuerbach. This resulted in a philosophical-biographical work in two volumes, "Ludwig Feuerbach". In 1876 he published the book "Philosophy in the Present." In this he dealt with the "History of Materialism" by Friedrich Albert Lange . On the basis of his studies in the history of literature and art, the "cultural history of the 16th century" and the "cultural history of the 17th century" emerged as products of the materialistic - positivistic view of history.

Works (selection)

• Letter to Dr. Karl Gutzkow regarding his "contemporaries". As a preface to his “Book of Hikes” . Theodor Fischer, Cassel 1839
• Gutenberg songs. Dedicated to the city of Strasburg by Karl Grün . Schmidt & Grucker, Strasbourg 1840
• My expulsion from Baden and my justification before the German people. Publishing house of the literary comptoir, Zurich and Winterthur 1843 digitized
• The Jewish question. Against Bruno Bauer . Carl Wilhelm Leske, Darmstadt 1843 digitized
• Friedrich Schiller as a person, historian, thinker and poet. FA Brockhaus, Leipzig 1844 New edition. FA Brockhaus, Leipzig 1849 digitized
• The social movement in France and Belgium, letters and studies. Carl Wilhelm Leske, Darmstadt 1845
• About Goethe from the human point of view. Carl Wilhelm Leske, Darmstadt 1846 digitized
• Pierre-Joseph Proudhon : Philosophy of State Economy or Necessity of Misery. German edited by Karl Grün . Carl Wilhelm Leske, Darmstadt 1847
• Western European borders. From an official of civilization . Lintz, Trier 1853
• The Eastern European Danger. From the author of the Western European Borders . Lintz, Trier 1854
• Louis Napoleon Bonaparte , the Sphinx on the French imperial throne. Otto Meißner, Hamburg 1859 digitized
• France before the judge's seat of Europe or the question of borders . 1860 pamphlet
• Italy in spring 1861. EA Fleischmann's Buchhandlung, Munich 1861 digitized
• Fragments from Italy. Nature and art. EA Fleischmann's Buchhandlung, Munich 1862 digitized
• Speech given at the Freiligrath celebration on July 1, 1867 in Heidelberg . Mannheim 1867
• Cultural history of the 16th century. CF Winter, Leipzig / Heidelberg 1872
• Ludwig Feuerbach in his correspondence and legacy . 2 vols. CF Winter, Leipzig / Heidelberg 1874
• The philosophy in the present. Realism and idealism. Depicted critically and in a common sense . Otto Wigand , Leipzig 1876
• Cultural history of the 17th century. 2 vols. JA Barth, Leipzig 1880
• Manuela Köppe (Ed.): Karl Grün. Selected writings in two volumes . Akademie Verlag 2005 ISBN 3-0500-4146-3

literature

• Criminal procedure against Dr. C. Green and 22 comrades. Because of treason resp. Looting of the arsenal in Prüm. Negotiated before the Assize in Trier in January 1850 . Lintz, Trier 1850 digitized
• Carl Stegmann, C. Hugo: Handbook of Socialism . Zurich 1894, p. 310 f.
• Ludwig Julius Fränkel:  Green, Karl . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 49, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1904, pp. 583-589.
• Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon (1905), Vol. 8, p. 442
• Friedrich Wilhelm Reinhardt: Karl Theodor Ferdinand Green. A humanities study . Giessen, Phil. Diss. V. Jan. 14, 1924
• Wilhelm Sauerländer: Karl Theodor Ferdinand Grün and “True Socialism”. After a lecture at the Volkshochschule Lüdenscheid, held on February 9, 1955 . In: Lüdenscheider contributions. 5. Lüdenscheid 1958
• Wolfgang Schieder:  Green, Karl. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1966, ISBN 3-428-00188-5 , p. 186 f. ( Digitized version ).
• James Strassmaier: Karl Grün and the Communist Party 1845 - 1848 . Trier 1973 ( writings from the Karl-Marx-Haus No. 10)
• Eckhard Trox: Karl Grün (1817-1887). A biography. Accompanying volume for the exhibition . Lüdenscheid 1993 (Volume 1 Research on the History of the City of Lüdenscheid - Objects and Documents)
• Dieter Deichsel: The criticism of Karl Grüns. On the origin and transmission of Part IV of the second volume of the " German Ideology " . In: MEGA studies 1997-2 . Amsterdam 1998 ISBN 90-804191-2-5 , pp. 103-153
• Hans-Ulrich Seifert: Green, Karl Theodor Ferdinand . In: Trier Biographical Lexicon . Koblenz 2000 ISBN 3-931014-49-5 , pp. 145 f. with bibliography
• Manuela Köppe / Dieter Deichsel: On the reconstruction of the correspondence from Karl Grün (1817-1887) . In: Marx et autres exilés . Etudes en l'honneur de Jacques Grandjonc réunies par Karl Heinz Götze . Univ. de Provence, Aix-en-Provence 2002, pp. 113-134

Web links

Wikisource: Karl Grün  - Sources and full texts

• Literature by and about Karl Grün in the catalog of the German National Library
• Karl Marx, Karl Grün: The historiography of "true socialism
• Karl Grün in the Lexicon of Westphalian Authors