Wilhelm Schäfer (writer)

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Signature of Wilhelm Schäfer

Wilhelm Schäfer or during the first marriage from 1890 to 1896 Wilhelm Schäfer-Dittmar (born January 20, 1868 in Ottrau , † January 19, 1952 in Überlingen ) was a German writer .

Schäfer's work consists mainly of short stories and anecdotes based on the model of Kleist and Hebels . With the book Thirteen Books of the German Soul , which was published in 1922 and glorified the “German People's Soul” , he became one of the most popular völkisch- national authors of the Weimar Republic and the time of National Socialism .

Life

My parents by Wilhelm Schäfer (1944)

Wilhelm Schäfer was the son of a shoemaker . His father Paul Schäfer (born 1840) came from an impoverished farming family in Berfa (Alsfeld) . He had to go on a hike due to financial difficulties and learned the shoemaker's trade from 1855 to 1858 with the master shoemaker Wiegelmann. Mother Elisabeth Gischler came from Ottrau and her parents owned a small farm and a house in debt. As a young woman, she worked as a maid for the Ploch farmer.

In his book "Meine Eltern" (My Parents), Wilhelm Schäfer describes the working and living conditions, the traffic conditions and the military service of his father in Kassel . His portrayals of the Kulturkampf in the Catholic Rhineland , as experienced by the family, are revealing .

In 1871 the family moved to Gerresheim , where Schäfer attended a Protestant elementary school in the glassworks settlement . Afterwards he was a student at the Realgymnasium in Düsseldorf and from 1883 he prepared himself for the job of elementary school teacher at a preparatory institute in Mettmann . From 1890 to 1897 he worked as a teacher in Vohwinkel and Elberfeld . During this time, which was also characterized by a friendship with Richard Dehmel , he began to publish literary works.

A contract with Cotta-Verlag enabled him to travel to Paris , Zurich and Munich in 1897 after he divorced Henriette Dittmar, whom he had married in 1890 . In 1898 he went to Berlin , where he initially worked as an ad copywriter. In 1899 he married Lisbeth Polligkeit. In 1900 he moved to Dusseldorf , where he at the suggestion of circles of the artists' association paint box and the industrialist and art patron Fritz Koegel the cultural magazine The Rhineland (1900-1922) published and CEO of the Association of Friends of Art in the countries on the Rhine was.

Schäfer, who became friends with Hermann Hesse during these years , lived in Braubach from 1903 , from 1907 to 1915 in Vallendar and from 1915 to 1918 in Hofheim ( Taunus ), the home of his lover Blanche von Fabrice, the writer's wife who was divorced in 1909 Emanuel von Bodman , whom he married in 1917 after divorcing Polligkeit. In 1918 he settled on the "Sommerhalde" in Bodman on Lake Constance . He worked on his work The Thirteen Books of the German Soul for five years.

From 1926 Wilhelm Schäfer was a member of the poetry section of the Prussian Academy of the Arts ; In 1931 he left the academy together with Erwin Guido Kolbenheyer and Emil Strauss because of differences over the ideological orientation of the institution. After the National Socialist seizure of power , he was honorary senator of the German Academy of Poetry from May 1933 . Schäfer, who was influenced by conservative and national ideas early on , largely identified himself with National Socialist ideology and, although he was not a member of the NSDAP himself , willingly helped formulate and propagate the goals of NS cultural policy. Schäfer was highly valued by Adolf Hitler , so that in August 1944 he added him to the list of the most important writers who had been gifted by God .

His entanglement in the system of the Nazi state meant that after 1945 his work was only sporadic.

After Schäfer's death in Überlingen in 1952, the coffin was brought from Lake Constance, where Schäfer had lived since 1918, to Ottrau and, at his request, buried there in the family crypt.

Schäfer's writings (all published by Langen / Müller , Munich) Prussia and the Bismarckian Empire. From “Thirteen Books of the German Soul” (1934), Christophorus Speech (1935) and War and Poetry: Ceremonial Speech for the Poets' Meeting in Weimar on October 10, 1942 (1943) were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out in the Soviet occupation zone .

Awards

Schäfer received the following awards: 1927 an honorary doctorate from the University of Marburg , 1932 the Goethe plaque of the city of Frankfurt am Main , 1937 the Rheinische Literaturpreis , 1941 the Goethe Prize of the city of Frankfurt am Main , 1942 the Immermann Prize ; In 1938 he was made an honorary citizen of Ottrau , in 1948 an honorary citizen of Bodman and in 1950 an honorary member of the Düsseldorf Jonges .

Afterlife

The primary school in Schäfer's birthplace Ottrau, which opened in 1951, was named Wilhelm Schäfer School in 1977. After a discussion about his involvement in National Socialism, the district council of the Schwalm-Eder district decided on June 29, 2020 that the name Wilhelm-Schäfer-Schule was withdrawn with immediate effect.

Works

  • Fritz and Paul at the higher middle school . Berlin 1894
  • Man people . Elberfeld 1894
  • A blackjack . Elberfeld 1894
  • Songs of a Christian . Elberfeld 1895
  • Jacob and Esau . Berlin 1896
  • The Ten Commandments . Berlin 1897
  • Gottlieb Mangold . Berlin 1900
  • William Shakespeare . Zurich 1900
  • The Béarnaise . Berlin 1902
  • International art exhibition Düsseldorf 1904 . Düsseldorf 1904 (together with Rudolf Klein )
  • The German Association of Artists . Düsseldorf 1905
  • Anecdotes . Düsseldorf 1907
  • The Lower Rhine and the Bergisches Land . Stuttgart 1907
  • Rhine legends . Berlin 1908
  • The collar story . Munich [among others] 1909
  • The bad guys . Munich [among others] 1909
  • The writer . Frankfurt a. M. 1910
  • How did my anecdotes come about? . Dortmund 1910
  • 33 anecdotes . Munich [including] 1911
  • The lost coffin and other anecdotes . Munich [including] 1911
  • Karl Stauffer's life story . Munich [ua] 1912. Dedicated to Hermann Hesse online (2nd edition)  - Internet Archive
  • The interrupted cruise on the Rhine . Munich [including] 1913
  • Life day of a philanthropist . Berlin 1915
  • Anecdotes and sagas . Bern 1918
  • The buried hand and other anecdotes . Munich 1918
  • Narrative writings . Munich
    • 1. Anecdotes and short stories . 1918
    • 2. Rhine legends . 1918
    • 3. A Chronicle of Passion . 1918
    • 4th day of the life of a philanthropist . 1918
  • Breakdown of life . Munich 1918
  • Three letters . Munich 1921
  • Early days . Leipzig [among others] 1921
  • Rhenish novellas . Leipzig 1921
  • Winckelmann's end . Munich 1921
  • The thirteen books of the German soul . Munich 1922
  • The German god . Munich 1923
  • Flame verses . Szczecin 1924
  • The song of Kriemhild's distress . Munich 1924
  • The modern painting of German Switzerland . Leipzig 1924
  • Urania . Szczecin 1924
  • The Baden cure . Stuttgart 1925
  • Benno Rüttenauer on his seventieth birthday . Munich 1925
  • The German Jewish question . Munich 1925
  • Germany . Dessau 1925
  • Holderlin's contemplation . Munich 1925
  • Jakob Imgrund . Chemnitz 1925
  • The Miss von Rincken . Munich 1926
  • Kind regards Zwingli . Munich 1926
  • Life day of a philanthropist . Berlin 1926
  • New anecdotes . Munich 1926
  • Letters from Switzerland and experiences in Tyrol . Munich 1927
  • Kind regards Zwingli . Weimar 1927
  • Rhenish stories and other things . Berlin 1927
  • Albrecht Dürer . Chemnitz 1928
  • Ludwig Böhner gives his last concert . Munich 1928
  • Novellas . Munich 1928
  • Summer dump . Chemnitz 1928
  • The anecdotes . Munich 1929
  • Selected anecdotes . Hamburg 1929
  • The captain of Koepenick . Munich 1930
  • The red Hanne . Düsseldorf 1930
  • The poet and his people . Kassel 1931
  • Breakfast at the Heidecksburg . Eisenach 1931
  • The house with the three doors . Munich 1931
  • Adopted home . Frauenfeld [et al.] 1931
  • The strange lady . Ten anecdotes. Insel, Leipzig 1931
  • The journey into Christmas Eve . Eisenach 1932
  • The Frau von Stein and other stories . Wroclaw 1932
  • Goethe's birthplace . Frankfurt a. M. 1932
  • On the trail of the old imperial glory . Munich 1933
  • German speeches . Munich 1933
  • The manufacturer Anton Beilharz and the Theresle . Munich 1933
  • The stubborn thaler or a literary night in Berlin . Eisenach 1933
  • The German relapse into the Middle Ages . Munich 1934
  • Johann Sebastian Bach . Leipzig 1934
  • A man named Schmitz . Munich 1934
  • My life. Accountability . Berlin 1934
  • Prussia and the Bismarck Empire . Munich 1934
  • St. Christopher's speech . Munich 1935
  • From old Blücher . Güstrow, Meckl. 1935
  • Anckemann's Tristan . Munich 1936
  • The poet of Michael Kohlhaas . Munich 1936
  • The gloves of Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau . Leipzig 1936
  • The post office keeper in Vöcklabruck . Eisenach 1936
  • The sources of the Rhine . Berlin [among others] 1936
  • Concealed life . Leipzig 1936
  • Mrs. Hulla . Eisenach 1937
  • Hermann W. Schäfer . Munich 1937
  • My parents . Munich 1937
  • The signet ring of Tyrol . Eisenach 1937
  • The brave Maruck . Leipzig 1937
  • Tropic of new anecdotes . Munich 1937
  • The monastery brewer . Leipzig 1938
  • My life's work . Munich 1938
  • Six matches . Berlin 1938
  • The other Gulbransson . Berlin [among others] 1939
  • Eleven Goethe anecdotes . Berlin 1939
  • Jan Wellm . Saarlautern 1939
  • Theodoric, King of the West . Munich 1939
  • From the time of the wars of liberation . Munich 1940
  • The grandson of Tiberius . Eisenach 1940
  • The fake fifty-mark note . Überlingen 1940
  • A hundred stories . Munich 1940
  • Johannes Gutenberg . Mainz 1940
  • Bismarck . Cologne 1941 (together with Otto Brües and Richard Euringer )
  • The triple deputation . Weimar 1941
  • Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau's gloves and other anecdotes . Wiesbaden 1941
  • Small chest . Munich 1941
  • Maria Enderlin's healing . Frankfurt am Main 1941
  • Old man summer . Munich 1942
  • The German face of Rhineland art . Ratingen 1942
  • Goethean examination . Munich 1942
  • The Freiburg rebel . Gütersloh 1942
  • The silver wedding . Cologne 1942
  • Late picking old and new anecdotes . Munich 1942
  • War and poetry . Munich 1943
  • Against the humanists. A speech given on May 7, 1942 in the Wittheit zu Bremen. Langen-Müller, Munich 1943
  • Two anecdotes . Leipzig 1943
  • Two stories from the Rhineland . Leipzig 1943
  • The separation and the common . Strasbourg 1944
  • The friend of God . Kempen-Niederrh. 1948
  • Accountability . Kempen-Niederrh. 1948
  • The beaver castle . Munich 1950
  • The queen's collar . Augsburg 1951
  • Mrs. Millicent . Stuttgart 1952

Editing

  • Stone drawings by German painters . Düsseldorf 1904/1905
  • Sculptor and painter in the countries on the Rhine . Düsseldorf 1913
  • Fedor M. Dostoevskij : The Grand Inquisitor . Rudolstadt (Thuringia) 1924

literature

  • Wilhelm Schäfer . In: The little book of poet pictures . Albert Langen / Georg Müller, Munich 1938, p. 48 with photography. (= The small library )
  • Municipal Wessenberg Gallery Konstanz , Museum Giersch , City of Karlsruhe - Municipal Gallery : The other modern. Art and artists in the countries on the Rhine from 1900 to 1922 . Imhof, Petersberg 2013 ISBN 978-3-86568-951-1
  • Karl Rick: Wilhelm Schäfer . Bonn 1914
  • Karl Röttger (Ed.): Wilhelm Schäfer . Munich 1918
  • Otto Doderer (Ed.): Confession to Wilhelm Schäfer . Munich 1928
  • Hans Lorenzen: Types of German anecdotal narration . Hamburg 1935
  • Franz Stuckert: Wilhelm Schäfer . Munich 1935
  • Conrad Höfer: Wilhelm Schäfer . Berlin
    • Volume 1 (1937)
    • Volume 2. Continuations, additions, corrections . 1943
  • Günther Kurt Eten: Wilhelm Schäfer . Borna-Leipzig 1938
  • Karl Zaum: Wilhelm Schäfer . Düsseldorf 1938
  • Josef Hamacher: The style in Wilhelm Schäfer's epic prose . Bonn 1951
  • Bernd Kortländer (Ed.): Wilhelm Schäfer . Düsseldorf 1992
  • Sabine Brenner (ed.) & Heinrich Heine Institute Düsseldorf: “Ganges Europe, holy river!” The literary Rhine 1900–1933. Exhibition catalog. Droste, Düsseldorf 2001 ISBN 9783770011414 (in addition to WS: Alfons Paquet , Herbert Eulenberg and others)
  • Wolfgang Delseit:  Shepherd, Wilhelm. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 22, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-428-11203-2 , p. 515 f. ( Digitized version ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Sabine Brenner: “Awakening the Rhineland from its slumber!” To the profile of the cultural magazine Die Rheinlande (1900–1922). Grupello Verlag, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-89978-022-1 .
  2. ↑ Wilhelm Schäfer: Dedication for Hermann Hesse on page 7. Karl Stauffer's life story - a chronicle of passion. 1912, Retrieved June 12, 2019 .
  3. ↑ W. Schäfer, Small chest. Munich 1941. p. 286.
  4. ^ Ernst Klee : The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-10-039326-5 , p. 513.
  5. ↑ Bernd Lindenthal: Writer and poet Wilhelm Schäfer about his homeland. Hessisch Niedersächsische Allgemeine, December 28, 2019, accessed on December 29, 2019 .
  6. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1946-nslit-s.html
  7. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1947-nslit-s.html
  8. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1948-nslit-s.html
  9. ↑ {Internet source | author = Matthias Haaß | url = https://www.hna.de/lokales/schwalmstadt/ottrau-ort141742/ottrauer-wilhelm-schaefer-schule-schliesst-mit-dem-namen-des-nazi-autors -ab-90009151.html | titel = Kreisag votes for the renaming - Ottrauer Wilhelm-Schäfer-Schule closes with the name of the Nazi author | werk = | hrsg = Hessisch Niedersächsische Allgemeine | date = 2019-12-28 | retrieval = 2020-07-13 | language = de}
  10. ↑ {Internet source | author = Matthias Haaß | url = https://www.hna.de/lokales/schwalmstadt/ottrau-ort141742/ottrauer-wilhelm-schaefer-schule-schliesst-mit-dem-namen-des-nazi-autors -ab-90009151.html | titel = Kreisag votes for the renaming - Ottrauer Wilhelm-Schäfer-Schule closes with the name of the Nazi author | werk = | hrsg = Hessisch Niedersächsische Allgemeine | date = 2019-12-28 | retrieval = 2020-07-13 | language = de}
  11. ↑ 19 pages. Also in: Strasbourg monthly books, edited by Friedrich Spieser
personal data
SURNAME Shepherd, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schäfer-Dittmar, Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer
DATE OF BIRTH January 20, 1868
PLACE OF BIRTH Ottrau
DATE OF DEATH January 19, 1952
Place of death Überlingen