Johann Peter Hebel

Johann Peter Hebel ( born May 10, 1760 Basel, † September 22, 1826 in Schwetzingen ) was a German writer, theologian and educator. Because of his poem bands Allemannische poems he is widely regarded as the most important Alemannic dialect poet. His second known works are numerous, written in High German calendar stories.

Life

Johann Peter Hebel was born on May 10, 1760 Basel, where his parents worked in the summer of this patrician house Iselin. His childhood was spent half in the city, the other half in Hausen in the meadow valley, his mother Ursula, where his father worked as a weaver in winter the home village. " Since I have to be learned early rich and poor to be [ ... ] have nothing and have everything be happy with those who rejoice and weep with the sad ," said lever remembered in a design for a sermon later. As it turned out later in his work, lever was marked both by memories of the city of Basel as well as to rural meadow valley. Lever father Johann Jakob, who had come from the Hunsrück to southern Baden, died already in 1761 of typhoid fever. Also the typhoid succumbed lever younger sister Susanne, just a few weeks old. From 1766 lever visited the elementary school in Oberhausen and 1769 the Latin School in Schopfheim (today Theodor -Heuss -Gymnasium ), where he was a student of August Gottlieb Preuschen. In the summer months he was taught in the church school in Basel and from 1772 in the local high school on Cathedral Square. When the lever was thirteen, his mother became seriously ill. With an oxcart rushed lever and the Hausener Vogt Johann Jakob Maurer to Basel to bring the patient to Hausen. However, it died on the way in the presence of leverage between Brombach and stones.

1774 joined lever in Karlsruhe School illustrious, where he was financially supported by sponsors and as a " boarder " among others, his former teacher and current Hofdiakon Preuschen and his brother as well as at school professor Christof Mauritii, the constitutional lawyer Philipp Rudolf Stösser and the young officer Johann Nicolaus Friedrich Brauer dined. At the high school lever showed very good performances, was inducted into the Western society of the Margraviate of Baden in 1776 and graduated from high school in 1778. After a two-year study of theology (1778-1780) in Erlangen, he was in September 1780 in Karlsruhe the exam test and in November a candidate for a rectory. However, he did not get a such, but instead joined a job as a tutor in Hertingen the parish priest Schlotterbeck on. On request Schlotter Becks, he was ordained after two years and was also active in pastoral ministry in Hertingen and Tannenkirch. Lever used his time in Hertingen also for long walks in the Baden Oberland and up to the Hunsrück, the home of his father. In 1783 he was appointed Präzeptoratsvikar ( teaching assistant ) at Pädagogium in Lörrach. Connected with this task was preaching in Grenzach; However, the pay was so meager that lever they had to supplement with tutoring. With the Lörracher headmaster Tobias Günttert lever became friends. About him he met Gustave fencing, Güntterts sister, with whom he held a long-term platonic relationship and he wrote numerous letters. Lever remained unmarried all his life, although he the actress Henriette Hendel - Schütz very revered in later years. In 1791 he was appointed as a subdeacon to the Karlsruhe grammar school, which meant the departure of South Baden for him. In addition to teaching at the school he preached in Karlsruhe also occasionally at court, where he enjoyed great popularity. In 1792, as lever Hofdiakon was, in 1798 associate professor. At high school he continued to teach several subjects, including botany and natural history. He kept a collection of plants which he had compiled in an extensive herbarium. Lever was also a friend of the botanist Karl Christian Gmelin whose "Flora badensis Alsatica " he revised with respect to the botanical ( Latin and Greek ) names and diagnoses. Gmelin, in turn, took in this work the Ordinary Sims lily under the name Hebelia allemannica (now Tofieldia calyculata ) on. 1799 lever honorary member of the Jena Mineralogical Society, and in 1802 a corresponding member of the " Patriotic Society of Physicians and Naturalists in Swabia. " In his early years lever Klopstock and Jung-Stilling had read, and later he especially admired Jean Paul and Johann Heinrich Voss.

Lever remained apart until his death in Karlsruhe, with occasional travel to other parts of the country. His desire to be in a position as pastor of a parish in the meadow valley, was not met. How big is this desire was reflected in the fact that lever in 1820 wrote an inaugural sermon for a rural community and is among other things wrote: "On a peaceful country places to live among honest men as pastors and to die, was all that I wanted I've always wanted to this hour in the gayest and in the darkest moments of my life. "However, the lever, in his own words, " ascend to an invisible hand ever higher, ever further away out of the aim of my humble desires ". Although he received in 1805 the opportunity to take over, the Lutheran parish in Freiburg im Breisgau, this however refused the request of the Grand Duke Karl Friedrich. He became in 1808 director of the Karlsruhe grammar school, 1819 prelate of the Lutheran Church and thus a member of the first chamber of the Baden national assembly. As an elected representative, he devoted himself, according to his background, especially on education, churches and social policy. He supported among other applications establishing a deaf mute and blind institution and home for the better education of the Catholic clergy. A hiking ban for apprentices, however, he refused. At the inauguration of the parliament building in Karlsruhe lever was the keynote speaker. 1820 was awarded the Knight's Cross lever first, and later the Commander's Cross of the Order of Zähringerplatz lions. The union of the Lutheran and Reformed church of Baden to today's Evangelical Church in Baden in 1821 also played an important role lever: He campaigned for a common liturgy of the two churches and was the first signer of the Association be resolved Union certificate. For his work in uniting him the University of Heidelberg awarded an honorary doctorate in theology in the same year. Also, the new Evangelical church stood in front lever as prelate.

The native Upper Baden and his former haunts Hausen, Schopfheim, Lörrach and Weil 1812 he had visited one last time.

After 1815, complained lever propagated by health problems that worsened in the following years. In September 1826, he went on a mission to remove school exams in Mannheim and Heidelberg. After the tests in Mannheim, where he had already suffered from severe pain, he visited the horticulture director Johann Michael Zeyer and his wife in Schwetzingen. His health deteriorated and he developed a high fever. As it turned out later during the autopsy, he was suffering from cancer, and from Schwetzingen, Mannheim and Karlsruhe summoned doctors could no longer help him: Lever died on the night of September 22, 1826 in Schwetzingen and was buried there. His successor as Prelate of the Baden State Church was Johannes Bähr.

Work

Allemannische poems

Lever literary work began, apart from some early experiments, the end of the 18th century. In 1799 he visited on a trip his Wiesenthäler home. After his return to Karlsruhe, he wrote in the following two years, inspired by the longing for his homeland, the Allemannischen poems. The 32 poems " for friends rural nature and manners " were written in the dialect Wiesenthäler. In Basel, however, lever found no publisher who dared to publish a book on Alemannisch, and in 1803 published a collection of poems in Philip Macklot in Karlsruhe. And also for this publication had lever and his friends have to do some preliminary work, because the publisher demanded in advance a sufficient number of pre -takers. It is also interesting that the first edition of the poems only under the initials JPH and with a dedication to lever relatives and friends in Hausen appeared. Possible reasons are shyness and modesty, but also called fear of failure.

In the Allemannischen poems turned lever of life, landscape and dialect of his home is; from the river meadow on a description of the advantages of the Breisgau up to work in Hausener ironworks. Perhaps the best known poem is The Alemannic transience. In the poem about death and decay of the Father ( Ätti ) explains the Bueb reference to the castle ruins Rötteln how one day even the unexampled in its glory Basel and even the whole world will be forfeited. Lever has it also processes its own experience of his mother's death: The conversation between Ätti and Bueb takes place on a cart on the road between stones and Brombach, exactly at the place and under the circumstances in which lever his mother had lost. The Allemannischen poems was granted an enormous success - to the anonymous edition of 1803 followed a year later a new, this time naming the author. Also lever sovereign, Margrave Karl Friedrich, was apparently impressed by the poems. Lever had him repeatedly read aloud, noting the exact knowledge of the place of the Marquis: "I have to wonder how the Marggr. all villages and nests, shrubs and hedges of Utzenfeld to Lörrach forth knew and could always say that is that, and ia so ists " in the following decades further editions appeared in Aarau, Vienna and Reutlingen.. Famous poets like Jean Paul (1803 ) and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1804 ) wrote reviews about the poems. Lever itself rejoiced in a letter: "I can at certain moments innwendig be unruly pride in me and feel me up for drunkenness happy that I managed to make our otherwise so despised and ridiculed classisch language, and he has such a Celebritat to Ersingen. "

The Allemannischen poems are among the most frequently illustrated poems in German literature. They were, among others, illustrated by Benjamin Zix ( three etchings in the third edition of the poems ), Sophie Reinhard, Julius Nisle, Ludwig Richter and Kaspar Koegler. The Ten leaves after lever Allemannischen poems, composed and radirt by Sophie Reinhard (1820 ) were, without naming the artist, on a postcard series popularized ( CR Publishing crediting, Lörrach, lever postcard No. 1-10 ). Some pictures of the poems also can be found on the Token of Schopfheim.

Calendar stories

Lever second known works are his calendar stories, which he wrote in 1803 for the Baden Country Calendar and particularly from 1807 for its successor, the Rhinelander family friend. The old Lutheran- Baden Country Calendar had the early 19th century marketing difficulties, and lever was a member of a commission to develop proposals for improvement. During the discussions lever eventually became an editor for the new calendar, which bore the name of the Rhineland family friend and first appeared in 1807. One of the major innovations of the house friend was the enlarged part of the text in the " educational news and funny stories " were published. Lever self-written each year about 30 of these stories and thus played a key role in the success of the house friend whose circulation has doubled to around 40,000 copies. 1811 appeared on top of the treasure house of the Rhenish friend, a collection of the most interesting stories calendar. Other editions followed in 1816 and 1827. Lever stories told news, small stories, anecdotes, comical, modified fairy tales and the like. They were used for entertainment, let the reader but also a lesson from the text draw. The most famous Kalendergeschichten lever are unexpected reunion and Kannitverstan. According to Ernst Bloch former is " the best story in the world". 1815, however, came to battle, as the lever 1814 Calendar authored story The pious Council, which had been partially seen by Catholics as offensive, has been removed from the calendar. In the following lever resigned as editor and wrote significantly less Kalendergeschichten than in previous years. Only for the calendar 1819, he jumped again one with a larger number of articles from his pen, to allow the appearance of the house Rhinelander friend this year.

Bible Stories

After the calendar stories to lever very dedicated in the design for a new biblical textbook for the Protestant religious instruction. Lever produced an opinion on where he established several criteria for the new Textbook: There should be a clear and simple sentence structure and an exciting narrative of the biblical accounts have, while the age of the young readers - between ten and fourteen years - into account. Finally lever himself received the order to write such a book. Created the Biblical stories that were published in 1824 and was until 1855 textbook in five years' work. The Catholic authorities preconceived lever Bible stories to positive; a slightly modified Catholic school book version was already planned and approved by lever, but then was ousted by another editor.

Reception and legacy

For lever admirers included such famous writers such as Goethe, Gottfried Keller and Leo Tolstoy. Goethe, who had tried even once in a poem in Alemannic dialect, in particular praised the Allemannischen poems have leverage, as Goethe, " quite verbauert to the most naive, most graceful way the universe. " Goethe defended himself against calls lever poems translate: " such a poet must be read in the original! Then you have to stop learning this language! " In a meeting with lever in October 1825, Goethe took from that of the Allemannischen recite poems and later wrote about him, he was" a very great man ". Other admirers lever were the Brothers Grimm. With Jacob Grimm in 1814, there was also a meeting in Karlsruhe.

Special emphasis is on the lever work the combination of folksy with deeper statements and thoughts. So, for example, praised August Vilmar, lever transience give the folk moderate foreground a background, you look in vain for other folk idyll poets. Vilmar also lifted the lever descriptions of nature, the meadow and the poem Sunday morning show, but especially the stories of Schatzklästleins: " The stories [ ... ] are totally unbeatable at whim, to deep and true feeling of vividness of representation and weigh a whole load of novels. "Even Theodor Heuss praised to lever work that he did not use the down- Alemannic language Parodisierung and vulgarization, but to " a tool genuine poetic activity " made ​​and a work created in the so Heuss, " the undertone of Stay ends, the valid, the Eternal, the eternally human resonates ".

Even later authors mounted lever against high esteem. Characteristic of this is a quote from Hermann Hesse: " We read, I believe, even today not yet in any literary history that lever was the largest German narrator, as large as only the basement and much safer and in the effect of pure and powerful than Goethe. " Theodor W. Adorno praised Johann Peter Hebel's essay the Jews as a " the most beautiful pieces of prose in defense of the Jews, written German, " and Elias Canetti described in the Tongue, what value had lever treasure for him: " No book has. , I wrote, I do not secretly degree of his language, and each I first wrote down in shorthand, knowledge of which I owe him alone, " Marcel Reich -Ranicki wrote:" lever stories are among the most beautiful in German language, " and took the treasure up in his canon of German literature. Also part of the canon is The Rose, one of the few High German poems lever. The treasure was also included in the TIME library of 100 books.

Patrick Roth wrote in his essay Johann Peter Hebel's Hollywood or Freeway to the valley of Balzac (1995 ), a further tribute to Leverage: The text tells the story of self-discovery of the young Roth as German writers in America and begins with a drive through Los Angeles and on tape read Roth's favorite story: " An unexpected reunion '. From levers so related that one learns to believe, but again watch all Lovers Lost some day. "

The writer and literary critic WG Sebald interpreted in his essay There is a comet in the sky - Calendar contribution in honor of the Rhenish House friend's calendar stories as the deepest emotional moments. Language lever return inwards and the narrator put us almost felt his hand on her arm: " lever is released from the context of life and embarks on those longer waiting, from where you [ ... ] over looks into the distant Promised country of man, that native level, has been yet no one in the [ ... ]. "

The life and work of lever dedicated to, among other things, the lever collar Lörrach, the leverage covenant garbage home and Basler lever Foundation.

Honors

Lever to honor 1936 Johann- Peter-Hebel - prize was donated. The prize is awarded by the state of Baden- Württemberg every two years to a writer, translator, essayist, media professionals or scientists who are connected by their journalistic work the Alemannic -speaking or Johann Peter Hebel. Hosting the 10,000 Euro prize is Hausen in the meadow valley, where every year takes place on May 10, the lever hard. The community gives Hausen top of that each year the Johann- Peter-Hebel - Commemorative Plaque on personalities from the Upper Rhine region.

In 1926, the Lörracher Pädagogium, lever former workplace, renamed lever High School. Also in Pforzheim and in Schwetzingen the local high schools are named after him. Several primary schools - mainly in South Baden, but also in Essen and Berlin - as well as many roads in the German-speaking world bear his name. Lever monuments are located, among other things in the Karlsruhe Castle Park, in Basel, Hausen and Hebelpark Lörrach.

The Evangelical Church in Germany has set up a memorial day for lever in the Protestant calendar name on 22 September.

Works

• Allemannische poems. For friends of rural nature and customs. Karlsruhe in 1803 anonymously ( digitized and full text in German Text Archive ) (second edition 1804 Responsibility ) Allemannische poems. For friends of rural nature and customs. Poésies Alémaniques. Pour les amis de la nature et des mœurs rurales Traduit par Raymond Matzen. Bilingual edition Alemannic / French Kehl am Rhein: Morstadt Verlag 2010, ISBN 978-3-88571-362-3

• Calendar stories. Carl Hanser, Munich 1999

• From the treasure house of the Rhenish friend. Illustrated by K. F. Schulz. Furth im Wald: Vitalis 2001, ISBN 3-934774-93-8.