Niklaus Meienberg

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Niklaus Meienberg (1979)

Niklaus Meienberg (born May 11, 1940 in St. Gallen ; † September 22, 1993 in Zurich ) was a Swiss historian , journalist and writer .

Meienberg lived in Zurich and published ten books with reports and texts on contemporary history during his lifetime . These contributed significantly to the formation of public opinion in Switzerland in the 20th century. His committed, aggressive and linguistically polished texts are still considered examples of investigative journalism and enjoy great importance in journalism schools.

Life

After five years of boarding school at the Disentis convent school, Niklaus Meienberg spent a year in the USA at the age of 20, in the New York office of the Federation of Migros Cooperatives. He then worked briefly as a bulldozer driver in Vancouver, Canada . He then began studying history as a major , first at the University of Freiburg , later at the ETH Zurich and with a scholarship in Paris . Back in Freiburg, he completed his studies with a thesis in De Gaulle and the USA from 1940-42 .

From 1966, Meienberg was Paris correspondent for Weltwoche for five years . From 1971 he made articles for the culture magazine Perspektiven des Schweizer TVs as well as several productions for Radio DRS , for example for the satirical show Facts Folder . At the same time he was (until 1976) a freelancer for the Zürcher Tages-Anzeiger and the Tages-Anzeiger magazine (now Das Magazin ). From 1982 to 1983 Meienberg was head of the Paris office of Hamburger Illustrierte Stern . He then worked as a writer and as a freelancer for the Zürcher WochenZeitung (WOZ) .

In 1973 he planned to publish his reports in book form and, while looking for a publisher, met the Swiss writer Otto F. Walter , with whom he developed a friendly relationship. However, personal and professional differences led to a falling out from around 1979 onwards. Meienberg accused Walter of using his life story inappropriately for his novels. There was also Walter's negative judgment on Meienberg's lyrical work. After private contact had already come to a standstill, the two held a public debate in the WOZ in 1983/1984 on the relationship between politically committed literature and social reality ("realism debate").

After the manic and depressive episodes that Meienberg went through (and described) since boarding school had subsided somewhat in the prime of the 90s, they increased in intensity again in the early 1990s and became maddened during the Gulf War . He believed that he was being persecuted by the CIA and that he had to save the world from nuclear war . On September 11, 1992, he was beaten up by two North Africans. He never recovered from the consequences of this attack. Further blows of fate followed in quick succession: the death of his mother, with whom he had a close but not unproblematic relationship; the separation from his last girlfriend; a harsh account of his work in the NZZ ; a serious motorcycle accident in France. Niklaus Meienberg died by suicide on September 22, 1993 .

Literary work

Because of his critical texts on Swiss history and the present, he was banned from writing for many years at the Tages-Anzeiger in 1976 - by the publisher Otto Coninx against the will of the editors. The decisive factor was an ironic article "A beautiful, serene birthday ..." about Prince Franz Josef II of Liechtenstein in the Tages-Anzeiger on August 7, 1976.

In 1977 he had to because of passages of the film The shooting of the traitor Ernst S. in court. Another summons arose because of a planned play about Ulrich Wille . Meienberg, who was defended by Moritz Leuenberger , won the trial against Willes' two sons.

In the spring of 1987, Meienberg wrote a critical, well-received series of articles for Weltwoche in which he portrayed Ulrich Wille and his family. As Die Welt als Wille & Wahn it was published in book form in the autumn of the same year. Meienberg relied, among other things, on unpublished letters from Willes to his wife, whom Meienberg had photographed in a decorative piece at an exhibition without permission, as he himself wrote in the afterword of the book: «The guard on duty at the Meilen local museum had never leafed through the book, but was pleased that the photographer Roland Gretler and I liked its content so much and didn't mind that I excerpted a few passages and Roland Gretler photographed a few dozen pages integrally. " The then critical historian and deputy editor-in-chief of the NZZ, Alfred Cattani, called the book a pamphlet , but agreed with Meienberg that the family's archive should be published. This did not happen until 2018, which is why there is still no critical biography.

Niklaus Meienberg's estate is kept in the Swiss Literary Archives in Bern.

Voices from contemporaries

«For me, Meienberg is above all a great prose writer. It does not matter where this prose finally appeared. It's similar to Heine's . Heinrich Heine wrote a large part of his work for newspapers. Today that is part of mandatory German prose. "

- Peter from Matt

"It's just true what he wrote."

- Max Frisch

Awards

Works

Filmography

literature

Movie

  • THE Meienberg. Documentary film portrait by Tobias Wyss . 84 min. Switzerland 1999.

Exhibitions

  • 2013/2014: «Why Meienberg? Pourquoi Meienberg? " Journalist, historian, poet & contemporary. Kulturraum am Klosterplatz, St. Gallen (August 16 - September 29, 2013) / Central and University Library Lucerne (November 16, 2013 to January 15, 2014)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. about thesis Herrmann (PDF; 460 KB).
  2. ↑ Urs Hafner: The fictional debate. In: WochenZeitung from February 2, 2006.
  3. ↑ Reto Caluori: From literary material to conflict material. The correspondence between Niklaus Meienberg and Otto F. Walter. ( Memento of the original from December 24, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Drafts - Journal for Literature , No. 24 (2000), pp. 51–64. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.entwuerfe.ch
  4. ↑ Jean-Martin Büttner: He lived loud and violent, he died very quietly. ( Memento of the original from November 18, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Tages-Anzeiger from February 19, 1999, on the Limmat Verlag website. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.limmatverlag.ch
  5. ↑ Renoldner  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (see literature)@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.limmatverlag.ch  
  6. ↑ He himself reported about it three weeks later in an article in the SonntagsZeitung ; later reprinted in: Zunder , 1993, pp. 179-193.
  7. ↑ Thomas Feitknecht: "You have to keep your eyes open." ( Memento from September 12, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) In: Tages-Anzeiger from December 15, 2005.
  8. ↑ Niklaus Meienberg tackles General Wille - and comes under fire himself , Neue Zürcher Zeitung of February 19, 2018, page 13
  9. ^ Adolf Grimme Prize 1982
  10. ^ Publisher's text
  11. ↑ Reviews ( Memento of the original from November 18, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on Marianne Fehr's Meienberg biography from 1999, on the Limmat Verlag website @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.limmatverlag.ch
  12. ↑ Film website ( Memento of the original from December 1, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. the Columbus movie @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.columbusfilm.ch
  13. ↑ Exhibition information ( Memento of the original from June 17, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on the website of the Cantonal Library of St. Gallen , accessed on August 16, 2013. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sg.ch
  14. ↑ He can still provoke. Exhibition review in the Tages-Anzeiger on August 16, 2013.
  15. ↑ Marc Tribelhorn: Return of a fire head. Exhibition meeting. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung , August 24, 2013, accessed on August 26, 2013.
personal data
SURNAME Meienberg, Niklaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss journalist and writer
DATE OF BIRTH May 11, 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH St. Gallen
DATE OF DEATH September 22, 1993
Place of death Zurich