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August von Kotzebue | |
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| Born | (1761-05-03)3 May 1761 |
| Died | 23 March 1819(1819-03-23) (aged 57) |
| Resting place | Mannheim |
| Occupation | Writer |
| Language | German |
| Citizenship | Saxe-Weimar Russian Empire |
| Alma mater | University of Duisburg |
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August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue (German:[ˈaʊɡʊstfɔnˈkɔtsəbuː],Russian:Евстафий Леонтьевич Коцебу,romanized: Yevstafiy Leontyevich Kotsebu; 3 May [O.S. 22 April] 1761 – 23 March [O.S. 11 March] 1819) was a Germanplaywright, who had also worked as a Russian diplomat.
In 1817, one of Kotzebue's books was burned during theWartburg festival. He was murdered in 1819 byKarl Ludwig Sand, a militant member of theBurschenschaften. This murder gaveMetternich the pretext to issue theCarlsbad Decrees of 1819, which dissolved theBurschenschaften, cracked down on the liberal press, and seriously restricted academic freedom in the states of theGerman Confederation.
Kotzebue was born on May 3, 1761 inWeimar,Saxe-Weimar, to the respected merchantKotzebue family and was educated at Wilhelm-Ernst-Gymnasium in Weimar, where his uncle, the writer and criticJohann Karl August Musäus, was among his teachers. In 1776 the young Kotzebue acted alongsideGoethe in the latter's playDie Geschwister when it premiered in Weimar.[1] In 1777, aged sixteen, he enrolled at theUniversity of Jena to studylegal science. He continued his studies at theUniversity of Duisburg, graduating in 1780, and practiced initially as alawyer in Weimar.
Through his association with Graf Goertz,Prussian ambassador at the Russian court, Kotzebue became secretary to the Governor General ofSaint Petersburg. In 1783 he was appointed assessor to the high court of appeals inReval, where he married the daughter of a Russianlieutenant general. He was ennobled in 1785 and became president of theMagistrat of theGovernorate of Estonia, a province of the Russian Empire.[2]
In Reval his first literary works were favourably received. His novelsDie Leiden der Ortenbergischen Familie (The Sorrows of the Ortenberg Family) (1785) andGeschichte meines Vaters (History of my Father) (1788) met with appreciation; even more so did his playsAdelheid von Wulfingen (1789),Menschenhass und Reue (Misanthropy and Repentance) (1790) andDie Indianer in England (The Indians in England) (1790).[2]
The good reputation of these works was, however, almost destroyed by a controversial dramatic satire,Doktor Bahrdt mit der eisernen Stirn (Doctor Bahrdt with the Iron Brow), which appeared in 1790 with the name ofKnigge on the title page.[2] Written in response to contention betweenJohann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann and leaders of Berlin's party of theEnlightenment, it linked each of Zimmermann's opponents to a particular sexual perversion. Kotzebue denied authorship, even when the police began to investigate the matter. This alienated both Zimmermann and Knigge, formerly his allies, and also gained Kotzebue a reputation for dishonesty and lasciviousness that he would never shake off.[3]
After the death of his first wife in 1790, Kotzebue retired from the Russian service and lived for a time in Paris andMainz. In 1795 he settled on an estate which he had acquired near Reval and devoted himself to writing. In the space of only a few years, he published six volumes of miscellaneous sketches and stories (Die jüngsten Kinder meiner Laune, 1793–1796) and more than twenty plays, many of which were translated into several European languages.[2]
In 1798 he was appointed dramatist to thecourt theatre inVienna, but differences with the actors soon obliged him to resign. He then returned to his native town, but as he was not on good terms with the powerful Goethe and had openly attacked theromantic style for which Goethe was known, his position in Weimar was uncomfortable.[4]
In April 1800 he decided to return to Saint Petersburg, but on his journey there he was arrested at the border on suspicion of being aJacobin and was escorted toTobolsk inSiberia. On June 11, 1800, he was sent from Tobolsk toKurgan, where he arrived 6 days later. However, he had written a comedy which flattered the vanity of EmperorPaul I of Russia; he was soon brought back, presented with an estate inVooru from the crown lands ofLivonia, have received rank ofcourt councillor, and appointed director of the German theatre in Saint Petersburg.[5] On July 7, 1800, he left Kurgan. Kotzebue wrote about this period in his life in the autobiographicalDas merkwürdigste Jahr meines Lebens (The strangest Year of my Life).
Kotzebue returned to Germany in 1801, after the assassination of the Emperor Paul I. Failing to establish himself in Weimar's literary circles, he moved toBerlin, where he editedDer Freimutige in collaboration withGarlieb Merkel from 1803 to 1807. In 1803 he began hisAlmanach dramatischer Spiele (Almanac of the Dramatic Arts), which was published posthumously in 1820.
In 1806, afterNapoleon's victory in theBattle of Jena-Auerstedt, Kotzebue fled to Russia and, in the safety of his estate inJerlep, Estonia, wrote many satirical articles against Napoleon Bonaparte, published in his journalsDie Biene (The Bee) andDie Grille (The Cricket).[5]
He started working for the department of foreign affairs in Saint Petersburg in 1816 and was sent to Germany as consul general for Russia a year later. Some suspected him of being a spy, and this view persisted for a long time, but in modern times it has been shown to be unfounded: he reported only on matters that were already public knowledge. Nevertheless, it is fair to say he was Russia's advocate in Germany.[6]
In a weekly journal (Literarisches Wochenblatt) which he published in Weimar, he scoffed at the pretensions of those Germans who demanded free institutions, and soon became detested by nationalist liberals. One of them,Karl Ludwig Sand, a theology student, plotted to kill him. On 23 March 1819, soon after Kotzebue had moved with his family to Mannheim, Sand attacked Kotzebue at his house.[5] According toAlexandre Dumas, père, when one of Kotzebue's children appeared and started to cry, Sand became overwrought and stabbed himself.
Sand was arrested and carefully nursed back to health. At his trial, he protested that Kotzebue was an enemy of the German people,[7] but he was convicted of the murder and executed later that year.
The assassination of Kotzebue providedPrince Metternich with arguments to convince the Confederation to enact theCarlsbad Decrees, imposing greater restrictions on universities and the press. After the death of Kotzebue,Ernst Ackermann remained as the sole editor of theLiterarisches Wochenblatt.
Though he was unfavourably reviewed by critics – many of whom saw his work as immoral – Kotzebue was one of the most popular writers of his time. In his essay "Why Do I Have So Many Enemies?", he blamed jealousy of his fame. He was politically conservative and cosmopolitan in outlook and spoke out against the antisemitism of student nationalists.[citation needed]
He was approached in 1812 byBeethoven, who suggested that Kotzebue write the libretto for an opera aboutAttila, which was never written. Beethoven did, however, produce incidental music for two of Kotzebue's plays,The Ruins of Athens (Beethoven's opus 113) andKing Stephen (opus 117).
Besides his plays, Kotzebue wrote several historical works: hisHistory of the German Empires wasburned by nationalist students at the 1817Wartburg Festival (which Sand attended).
Still read are his autobiographical writings,Meine Flucht nach Paris im Winter 1790 (1791),Über meinen Aufenthalt in Wien (1799),Das merkwürdigste Jahr meines Lebens (1801),Erinnerungen aus Paris (1804), andErinnerungen von meiner Reise aus Liefland nach Rom und Neapel (1805).[5]
As a dramatist he was extremely prolific: his plays numbered over 200 and were highly popular, not only in Germany but throughout Europe. His success, however, was seen[by whom?] as due less to any conspicuous literary or poetic ability than to his great facility in the invention of effective situations. He is at his best in comedies such asDer Wildfang,Die beiden Klingsberg andDie deutschen Kleinstädter, which contain cameos of German life. These plays held the stage in Germany long after the once-famousMenschenhass und Reue (Misanthropy and Repentance, but known in England asThe Stranger),Graf Benjowsky, and ambitious exotic tragedies likeDie Sonnenjungfrau andDie Spanier in Peru (whichSheridan adapted asPizarro) were forgotten.[5]
Theatre historians usually consider the runaway success ofThe Stranger, the English version ofMenschenhass und Reue, in both England (where it opened in 1798) and the United States as one of the harbingers of the emerging popularity of theatricalmelodrama, which dominated European and American stages for the first seventy-five years of the nineteenth century.[8][9]
Two collections of Kotzebue's dramas were published during his lifetime:Schauspiele (5 vols., 1797);Neue Schauspiele (23 vols., 1798–1820). HisSämtliche dramatische Werke appeared in 44 volumes in 1827–1829, and again, under the titleTheater, in 40 volumes in 1840–1841. A selection of his plays in 10 volumes appeared in Leipzig in 1867–1868. SeeHeinrich Doring,A. von Kotzebues Leben (1830); W. von Kotzebue,A. von Kotzebue (1881); Ch. Rabany,Kotzebue, sa vie et son temps (1893); W. Sellier,Kotzebue in England (1901).[5]
Kotzebue was the father of 18 children, among them Karl von Kotzebue (diplomat), Moritz von Kotzebue,Paul Demetrius Kotzebue,Alexander Kotzebue and the explorerOtto von Kotzebue.
Kotzebue Street inKalamaja, Tallinn, Estonia, is named after him and other family members who lived on the street, especially his son Otto.
Rejected Addresses (1812) by Robert and Horace Smith, contains a "travestie" parody ofThe Stranger.
Beethoven's "Turkish March", originally written as part of the incidental music to von Kotzebue'sThe Ruins of Athens, became one of this composer's most well-known pieces.
Jane Austen saw a Kotzebue play,The Birthday, at Bath in 1799. In her novelMansfield Park she used a version of another of his plays,Das Kind der Liebe, adapted byElizabeth Inchbald asLover's Vows (1798).[10]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Kotzebue, August Friedrich Ferdinand von".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 15 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 919–920.
"Коцебу, Август Фридрих Фердинанд" .Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary (in Russian). 1906.
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