Richard Pohl

Richard Pohl (September 12, 1826 – December 17, 1896) was a German music critic, writer, poet, and amateur composer. He figured prominently in the mid-century War of the Romantics, taking the side opposite Eduard Hanslick, and championing the "Music of the Future" (the progressive Romantic style of Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner).

Pohl was born in

In 1854 Pohl moved to Weimar, where he became an editor at the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik. He wrote invective-laden articles under the pseudonym "Hoplit" (from the Greek term hoplite, the foot-soldier of ancient Greece) in support of Liszt and Wagner, and critical of music of the more conservative Romantic composers.

While both Liszt and Wagner thanked him for his support, Wagner in particular cooled to Pohl in later years, especially after Pohl's assertion that Wagner borrowed his chromatic harmonies in Tristan und Isolde directly from Liszt.

Among Pohl's other works was a novel based on the life of Richard Wagner.

He retired to Baden-Baden in 1864, and died there.

References

• Article "Richard Pohl", in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980.
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