Karl Georg Büchner (17 October 1813 – 19 February 1837) was a German dramatist and writer of poetry and prose, considered part of theYoung Germany movement. He was also a revolutionary and the brother of physician and philosopherLudwig Büchner. His literary achievements, though limited, are generally held in great esteem inGermany. Many believe that had he not died young, he might have joined such central German literary figures asJohann Wolfgang von Goethe andFriedrich Schiller at the summit of their profession.[citation needed]
At the age of 21, Büchner wrote an essay entitled Hessian Courier that was called the most revolutionary manifesto of the 19th century before theCommunist Manifesto.[1]
In 1828, he became interested in politics and joined a circle ofWilliam Shakespeare aficionados, which later on probably became theGiessen and Darmstadt section of the Society for Human Rights (Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte).
Büchner in a 1833/34 drawing by his friendAlexis Muston
While Büchner continued his studies in Giessen, he established a secret society dedicated to the revolutionary cause. In July 1834, with the help of evangelical theologianFriedrich Ludwig Weidig, he published the leafletDer Hessische Landbote, a revolutionary pamphlet critical of social injustice in theGrand Duchy of Hesse. The authorities charged them with treason and issued a warrant for their arrest. Weidig was arrested, tortured and later died in prison in Darmstadt; Büchner managed to flee across the border to Strasbourg, where he wrote most of his literary work and translated two French plays byVictor Hugo,Lucrèce Borgia andMarie Tudor. Two years later, his medical dissertation, "Mémoire sur le Système Nerveux du Barbeaux (Cyprinus barbus L.)" was published in Paris and Strasbourg. In October 1836, after receiving his M.D. and being appointed by theUniversity of Zürich as a lecturer in anatomy, Büchner relocated toZürich, where he spent his final months writing and teaching until his death fromtyphus at the age of twenty-three.
Gravestone of Georg Büchner onGermaniahügel in Zürich-Oberstrass
His first play,Dantons Tod (Danton's Death), about theFrench Revolution, was published in 1835, followed byLenz (first partly published inKarl Gutzkow's and Wienberg'sDeutsche Revue, which was quickly banned).Lenz is a novella based on the life of theSturm und Drang poetJakob Michael Reinhold Lenz. In 1836, his second play,Leonce and Lena, satirized the nobility. His unfinished and most famous play,Woyzeck, exists only in fragments and was published posthumously.
By the 1870s, Büchner was nearly forgotten in Germany whenKarl Emil Franzos edited his works; these later became a major influence on thenaturalist andexpressionist movements.Arnold Zweig describedLenz, Büchner's only work of prose fiction, as "the beginning of modern European prose".
Georg Büchner,Werke und Briefe. Münchner Ausgabe (dtv, 1997).ISBN3-423-12374-5.
Georg Büchner,Dichtungen, Schriften, Briefe und Dokumente (Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 2006). ISBN 978-3-618-68013-0. The most complete, authoritative edition.
Georg Büchner,Complete Plays and Prose, trans. Carl Richard Mueller (Hill and Wang, 1963)
Georg Büchner,The Complete Plays: Danton's Death; Leonce and Lena; Woyzeck; Lenz; the Hessian Messenger; on Cranial Nerves; Selected Letters trans. John Reddick (Penguin Classics, 1993)ISBN0-14-044586-2.
Georg Büchner,Danton's Death, Leonce and Lena and Woyzeck, trans. Victor Price, (Oxford World's Classics, 1998).ISBN0-19-283650-1.
Garland, Henry Burnand; Garland, Mary (1986).The Oxford Companion to German Literature. Oxford: Oxford [Oxfordshire] ; New York : Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0-19-866139-9. "Büchner, Georg", p. 121.
Boehncke, Heiner; Brunner, Peter; Sarkowicz, Hans (2008).Die Büchners, oder, Der Wunsch, die Welt zu verändern (in German). Frankfurt am Main: Societäts-Verl.ISBN978-3-7973-1045-3.
Series on life of Georg Büchner, by Sybille Fuchs, reviewingGeorg Büchner: Revolutionary with pen and scalpel, an exhibition from 13 October 2013 to 16 February 2014 at the Darmstadium Conference Centre, Darmstadt:Part 1 –Part 2 –Part 3 –Part 4 –Part 5
