Friedrich Rückert

Johann Michael Friedrich Rückert was born 16 May 1788 in Schweinfurt and was the eldest son of a lawyer, Johann Adam Rückert, and his wife, Maria Barbara (née Schwappach). He was educated at the local Gymnasium and at the universities of Würzburg and Heidelberg. From 1816 to 1817, he worked on the editorial staff of the Morgenblatt at Stuttgart. Nearly the whole of the year 1818 he spent in Rome, and afterwards he lived for several years at Coburg (1820–1826), where he married Luise Wiethaus-Fischer in 1821. He was appointed a professor of Oriental languages at the University of Erlangen in 1826, and, in 1841, he was called to a similar position in Berlin, where he was also made a privy councillor. In 1849 he resigned his professorship at Berlin, and went to live full-time in his Gut (estate) at Neuses (now a part of Coburg). When Rückert began his literary career, Germany was at war with Napoleon; and in his first volume, Deutsche Gedichte (German Poems), published in 1814 under the pseudonym Freimund Raimar, he gave, particularly in the powerful Geharnischte Sonette (Sonnets in Arms/Harsh Words), vigorous expression to the prevailing sentiment of his countrymen. From 1815 to 1818, appeared Napoleon, eine politische Komödie in drei Stücken (Napoleon, a Political Comedy in Three Parts), of which only two parts were published. In 1817, Der Kranz der Zeit (The Wreath of Time), was published. He issued a collection of poems, Östliche Rosen (Eastern Roses), in 1822; and from 1834 to 1838 his Gesammelte Gedichte (Collected Poems) were published in six volumes, a selection which has passed through many editions. Rückert was master of thirty languages and made his mark chiefly as a translator of Oriental poetry and as a writer of poems conceived in the spirit of Oriental masters. Much attention was attracted by a translation of the Maqamat of Al-Hariri of Basra (Hariris Makamen) in 1826, Nal und Damajanti, an Indian tale, in 1828, Rostem und Suhrab, eine Heldengeschichte (Rostem and Suhrab, a Story of Heroes) in 1830, and Hamasa, oder die ältesten arabischen Volkslieder (Hamasa, or the Oldest Arabian Folk Songs) in 1846. Among his original writings dealing with Oriental subjects are: Morgenländische Sagen und Geschichten (Oriental Myths and Poems) (1837) Erbauliches und Beschauliches aus dem Morgenland (Edifying and Contemplative, from the Orient) (1836–1838) Brahmanische Erzählungen (Brahmin Stories) (1839). The most elaborate of his works is Die Weisheit des Brahmanen (The Wisdom of the Brahmins), published in six volumes from 1836 to 1839. The former and Liebesfrühling (Spring of Love) (1844), a cycle of love-songs, are the best known of all Rückert's productions. From 1843 to 1845 he issued the dramas Saul und David (1843), Herodes der Große ("Herod the Great") (1844), Kaiser Heinrich IV (1845) and Christofero Colombo (1845), all of which are considered greatly inferior to the work to which he owes his place in German literature. At the time of the Danish war in 1864 he wrote Ein Dutzend Kampflieder für Schleswig-Holstein (A Dozen Battle Songs for Schleswig-Holstein), which, although published anonymously, made considerable impression on audiences. Rückert died in 1866, aged 77, in Neuses, now part of Coburg. He is buried in the cemetery there. Rückert's poetry was commonly set to music and there are about 121 settings of his work – making him the fourth most-set German poet, behind Goethe, Heine and Rilke. Among the composers who set his poetry to music are Schubert, Robert and Clara Schumann, Brahms (including Two Songs for Voice, Viola and Piano, among others), Josef Rheinberger, Mahler (song cycles Kindertotenlieder and Rückert-Lieder), Max Bruch, Max Reger, and Elise Schmezer.