RÅ«dolfs Blaumanis

Rūdolfs Blaumanis ( born January 1, 1863 in Ērgļi, Governorate of Livonia, † September 4, 1908 in Punkaharju ) was one of the most famous Latvian writer and playwright.

Life

Rūdolfs Blaumanis attended a German business school in Riga. His first publications he wrote in German. When he returned home later, he devoted himself to the study of the Latvian language. In 1888, he was a correspondent for the newspaper for the city and country in Riga. He wrote prose as in Latvia today still very well-known novels The Raudup landlady (1889 ) and In the Shadow of Death ( 1899) and is considered the founder of psychological short story in Latvian. From 1890 also the first plays were performed by him, who treated the problems of Latvian peasant life. Skroderdienas Silmačos (Schneider days in Silmači ) is the most frequently performed play in the history of the Latvian theater.

Blaumanis translated many originally in his own language, Latvian mother works as his naturalistic drama The Indrans (1904 ) into German. Briefly, he worked for the newspaper of the New Current Dienas and lapa was with Aspazija, Jānis Poruks, August Deglavs worked with Mājas Viesis. 1900 published a collection of poems along with Andrievs Niedra 1901 he was at the magazine Pēterburgas Avīzes and 1906 in the journal Latvija. Appeared in 1906 in the Paul Neldner Verlag, Riga, his worked with Hans Schmidt 's adaptation of the Latvian texts from the collection of the compositions by Jazeps Vītols 200 Latvian folk songs with piano accompaniment. Between these activities in which he partially wrote under a pseudonym, he returned again and again for a long time on his farm in Braki Ērgļi back and released a number of successful short stories, plays and poems. However, his health deteriorated increasingly so that a sanatorium in 1908 he went to Finland, where he died.

Honors

• In Riga there in his former apartment a museum of Blaumanis and Janis Rozentāls.
• His homestead in Ērgļi was established in 1959 as a museum.

Works in German translation

( in chronological order of appearance )

• The Indrans. Drama from the Latvian national life. Translated from Latvian by the author and Oskar Schönhoff. Gulbis, Riga 1921. Reprints: Harro von Hirschheydt, Hannover- Doehren 1972 ISBN 3-7777-0980-8. .

• Reprints: Protestant publishing house, Berlin 1962.
• Translated from Latvian by the author. With an afterword by Rolf Füllmann. Crimson Verlag, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-902871-47-3.