Wilhelm Friedrich (publisher)

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Wilhelm Friedrich

Wilhelm Friedrich (born November 5, 1851 in Anklam , † October 9, 1925 in Magugnano on Lake Garda ; full name: Max Wilhelm Karl Friedrich ) was a German publisher .

Wilhelm Friedrich, son of a Prussian master builder, learned the trade of bookseller in Elbing . In Bonn , Venice , Kiev , Tbilisi and Lyon , he then broadened his professional and language skills. In 1878 he founded an international bookstore in Leipzig. In 1879 Friedrich took over the “Magazin für die Literatur des Auslandses”, a weekly literary magazine that was the official organ of the German Association of Writers from 1881 to 1885.

With his publishing house, conservative and modern realistic writers received a forum. In 1883 Wilhelm Friedrich brought out a novel by Theodor Fontane , Schach von Wuthenow . Since 1885 it was the most important publisher of the early naturalists , in which works by Karl Bleibtreu , Hermann Conradi and Detlev von Liliencron were published. From 1887 to 1896 he published the leading naturalistic magazine “ Die Gesellschaft ” by Michael Georg Conrad . Friedrich brought out over a thousand works within 15 years. He had the entire "modern", the "youngest Germany" or the "realists", as they called themselves, under contract.

However, due to internal disputes between his authors, Friedrich soon lost his reputation, as did his refusal to publish Gerhart Hauptmann's “ Before Sunrise ”. Finally, in 1895, he had to sell his literary publishing house.

From 1896 he lived on Lake Garda. He was expelled from Italy during the First World War . From 1916 to 1919 he headed the book and art publisher Ernst Finckh. He later took over the management of the publishing house that he had co-founded.

Quotes

  • Peter de Mendelssohn : With unbelievable verve and enthusiasm, he tried to give German literature something that it hadn't had for a long time and could no longer have under the new circumstances: a militant, progressive, universalistic cultural publisher that encompasses all branches of living literature . The attempt at that time was doomed, and it failed.
  • Detlev von Liliencron : We moderns would all have been screwed up and spoiled if we hadn't had Friedrich as a publisher.

literature

  • The German-language press. A biographical-bibliographical handbook. KG Saur, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-598-11710-8 , p. 303 ( excerpt from Google Books ).
  • Werner Hellge: The publisher Wilhelm Friedrich and the “magazine for literature at home and abroad”. A contribution to the literary and publishing history of early naturalism in Germany. In: Archives for the history of the book industry. Vol. 16. Frankfurt a. M., 1977, pp. 793-1215.
  • Werner Hellge: Fontane and the publisher Wilhelm Friedrich . In: Fontane leaves. Potsdam, Issue 14, 1973, pp. 9-53.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Peter de Mendelssohn, Wilhelm Friedrich, in: Ders., S. Fischer and his publishing house, Frankfurt am Main 1970, p. 60.
  2. ↑ Quoted from: Peter de Mendelssohn, Wilhelm Friedrich, in: Ders., S. Fischer und seine Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1970, p. 60.
personal data
SURNAME Friedrich Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Friedrich, Max Wilhelm Karl (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publisher
DATE OF BIRTH November 5, 1851
PLACE OF BIRTH Anklam
DATE OF DEATH October 9, 1925
Place of death Magugnano on Lake Garda