Christian Fürchtegott Gellert

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Christian Fürchtegott Gellert
Electoral Saxony, Holy Roman Empire

Christian Fürchtegott Gellert (4 July 1715 – 13 December 1769) was a German poet, one of the forerunners of the golden age of German literature that was ushered in by Lessing.[1]

Biography

Gellert was born at

Leipzig University in 1734 as a student of theology, but in 1738 Gellert broke off his studies as his family could no longer afford to support him and became a private tutor for a few years.[2] Returning to Leipzig in 1741, he contributed to the Bremer Beiträge, a periodical founded by former disciples of Johann Christoph Gottsched who had revolted against the pedantry of his school. Owing to shyness and poor health, Gellert gave up the idea of entering the ministry.[3] However, he finally completed his magister degree in 1743 and qualified as a university lecturer in 1744.[2] In 1745 he established himself as a Privatdozent in philosophy at the university of Leipzig, lecturing on poetry, rhetoric, and moral philosophy.[4] In 1751 he was appointed extraordinary professor of philosophy,[2] a post he held until his death at Leipzig in 1769.[3]

Works

C. F. Gellerts sämmtliche Schriften. 1 (1775)

Gellert was esteemed and venerated by his students, and others who knew him, due in great part to his personal character; he was known to be unflaggingly amiable and generous, and of unaffected piety and humility.[

Passion hymn written to the tune of "Herzliebster Jesu
".

Not a little of Gellert's fame is due to the time when he lived and wrote. The

Goethe.[6] Karl Philipp Moritz, in the context of his travels in England in 1782, remarked: "Among us Germans ... I can think of no poet's name beyond Gellert's which comes readily into the minds of the common people [in London]."[7]

The

psychological novel.[3]

Besides lecturing to large audiences on moral matters, Gellert maintained a wide-ranging correspondence with both strangers and friends, especially with those seeking advice on moral questions.[9] Regarded by many correspondents as a teacher also of good writing style,[2] in 1751 he published a volume of model letters, along with an essay on letter-writing (Briefe, nebst einer praktischen Abhandlung von dem guten Geschmacke in Briefen).[9]

Editions and studies

Haydn Abendlied zu Gott HobXXVc9

See Gellert's Sämtliche Schriften (first edition, 10 vols., Leipzig, 1769–1774; last edition, Berlin, 1867). Sämtliche Fabeln und Erzählungen have been often published separately, the latest edition in 1896. A selection of Gellert's poetry (with an excellent introduction) can be found in F. Muncker, Die Bremer Beiträge (Stuttgart, 1899).

For studies of Gellert's life and work see lives by

J. A. Cramer (Leipzig, 1774), H. Döring (Greiz, 1833), and H. O. Nietschmann (2nd ed., Halle, 1901); also Gellerts Tagebuch aus dem Jahre 1761 (2nd ed., Leipzig, 1863) and Gellert's Briefwechsel mit Demoiselle Lucius (Leipzig, 1823).[3]

Translations

Gellert's Fables and Other Poems. Translated by J. A. Murke (London: 1851).[10]

Fables and Tales by the German Aesop, C. F. Gellert (1715-1769). Translated by John W. Van Cleve (Lewiston and Lampeter: Mellen, 2013,

ISBN 978-0-7734-4514-7
).

"Jesus Lives! The Victory's Won" is a translation of Gellert's "Jesu lebt, mit ihm auch ich" (Jesus lives, I with him") from Geistliche Oden und Lieder. It is set to the tune of "Jesus, meine Zuversicht".[11]

Legacy

Beethoven set to music six of Gellert's poems as Sechs Lieder Gellerts am Klavier zu singen (1803); the poems were all from Geistliche Oden und Lieder, including "Die Ehre Gottes aus der Natur".[5] Some of Gellerts poems became hymns, such as "Wenn ich, o Schöpfer, deine Macht".

In 1857 Berthold Auerbach paid tribute to Gellert in his story "Gellerts letzte Weihnachten", published in his Deutscher Familienkalender (German family almanac); the story was translated into English as "Christian Gellert's Last Christmas", first published in 1869.[12]

Notes

  1. New International Encyclopedia
     (1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
  2. ^ a b c d e Wölfel, Kurt (1964), "Gellert, Christian Fürchtegott", Neue Deutsche Biographie (in German), vol. 6, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 174–175; (full text online).
  3. ^ a b c d e f  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Gellert, Christian Fürchtegott". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 11 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 558.
  4. ^ Witte, Bernd (2010). "Christian Fürchtegott Gellert: Schriftsteller und Universitätslehrer in Sachsens goldenem Zeitalter" (in German). Denkströme: Journal der Sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Issue 4. pp. 30-49 (online version). Retrieved 31 May 2017.
  5. ^ a b "Geistliche Oden und Lieder", in Henry and Mary Garland (Eds.), The Oxford Companion to German Literature. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986. p. 281.
  6. ^ a b "Christian Fürchtegott Gellert" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. X (9th ed.). 1879. pp. 134–135.
  7. ^ Carl Philip Moritz: Journeys of a German in England in 1782, tr. and ed. Reginald Nettel (New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1965), p. 45.
  8. ISBN 0-521-43437-8
    . p.416.
  9. ^ a b "Gellert, Christian Fürchtegot", in Henry and Mary Garland (Eds.), The Oxford Companion to German Literature. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986. p. 282.
  10. ^ Morgan, Bayard Quincy (1922). A Bibliography of German Literature in English Translation. University of Wisconsin. p. 133. Retrieved 2 July 2018.
  11. ^ Polack, W.G. (1941). Handbook to the Lutheran Hymnal. St. Louis: Concordia. p. 152.
  12. ^ Auerbach, Berthold. German Tales. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1869. The story is available as a stand-alone publication via Project Gutenberg.

External links

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