The German Renaissance, 1750-1830

And the Best of German Culture from the 1750s to the 1950s

In my new novel We Are Like Fire, three of the four main characters are Ren Prothero, a Denver-based Maslow-inspired psychotherapist, and his German friends Dieter Ulrich and Dieter’s fiancee Gisela Shroeder. It is December 1958 for this conversation and they are all in their thirties, born in the early 1920s. Ren is the narrator of the novel.

Here they meander through a number of names in German and Austrian culture before focusing on German-language literature and zeroing in on the German cultural figure about whom they’ll write their original play.

Dieter and Gisela sit with me in our living room.

“I’m late getting started writing the original play about German life,” I tell them.  “I can’t procrastinate any longer.  Let’s settle today on the topic.”

Dieter wastes no time in asserting his view.  “I just want to say that I know you’ve been determined to do a play about the Third Reich.  I still believe that’s a really bad idea.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Because German history did not start in 1933 and end in 1945!  You cannot define Germany forever by Hitler’s regime.  There’s much more to modern Germany than the Third Reich.”       

I think for a moment.  “Can the barbaric horror of millions of murdered people ever not be a focal point of discussion and memory?  Germans of every age have a duty to remember.”

Dieter holds firm.  “Up until Hitler took over in 1933, Germany was the world’s foremost intellectual force, leading humanity into the future in almost every field, and our best minds would have led us even higher.  This would have been the German century.  The Third Reich is only a brief chapter in the story of Germany.” 

What if he’s right?  Vera and my parents have also been telling me that my idea of a Third Reich play is a bad idea. 

“Tell me, Dieter, tell me about the best of German culture.”

His face lights up and he starts gesturing with enthusiasm.  “From the mid-1700s through 1932, the thinkers, philosophers, psychiatrists and psychologists, writers, scientists, engineers, and artists of Germany and Austria were the world’s best!”

“So you think we should focus on German excellence in some way?” I ask.

“Yes!”

“What period do you prefer we think about?”

“All the rest of it,” Dieter says.  “Especially the period from about 1750 to about 1830.  That was the German Renaissance, and it greatly exceeded the Italian Renaissance.”

“Who were its best minds?”

“All right, Ren,” Dieter answers.  “Let me name the first German and Austrian geniuses of that era who come to my mind.  Immanuel Kant.  Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock.  Gotthold Ephraim Lessing.  Alexander von Humboldt.  Friedrich von Schiller.  Heinrich von Kleist.  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.  Friedrich Schelling.  Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.  Friedrich Holderlin.  Novalis.  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.  Franz Joseph Haydn.  Ludwig van Beethoven.  Franz Schubert.  That’s 15 world-historical geniuses, and without me naming any painters, sculptors, or architects.”

“I’m deeply impressed,” I say. 

“Who wouldn’t be?”

I give this some thought.  “Very well, Dieter.  Let’s write a play about one of the geniuses of German history.  We don’t have to limit ourselves to these 15 geniuses.  Any genius since 1830 is worth considering, too.”

The three of us look at each other with blank expressions.  “How should we proceed?” Dieter asks.

I think quickly.  “Dieter and Gisela, each of you, without consulting with the other, write down the eight greatest musicians of all time who were German or Austrian.”

“In order from the best on down?” Dieter asks.

“In any order in which you think of them.”

They both start writing.  After a couple minutes they each hand me their sheet of paper.

Dieter’s list:

Richard Wagner          

     Ludwig van Beethoven

     Johann Sebastian Bach

     Georg Friedrich Handel

     Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

     Franz Joseph Haydn

     Gustav Mahler

     Johannes Brahms

Gisela’s list:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

     Johann Sebastian Bach

     Franz Joseph Haydn

     Ludwig van Beethoven

     Georg Friedrich Handel

     Johannes Brahms

     Gustav Mahler

     Richard Wagner

I look over the two lists three times.  “You named the same eight.  Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Handel, Haydn, Mahler, Mozart, and Wagner.”

A flash of surprise on both their faces.  Then they smile at each other, turn back to me, and look at me expectantly. 

“Should we write our play about one of them?” I ask.

“With music?” Gisela asks. 

“We’re not going to do a musical or have music,” I say.  “It’s not possible logistically or financially.”

“I don’t think we should do a play about a musician without music,” Gisela says.

I’ve taken us on a wrong turn.  “So that rules that out.” 

I scratch my neck.  Then I look at them with determination to get this right. 

“Okay, write down the eight best literary figures in the German language.”  They grab their pens and begin writing, each pausing a couple times to think.  Then they hand me their lists.

Dieter’s list:

     Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

     Friedrich Holderlin

     Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

     Friedrich von Schiller

     Erich Maria Remarque

     Thomas Mann

     Hugo von Hofmannsthal

     Eduard Morike

Gisela’s list:

   Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

        Hermann Hesse

        Friedrich Holderlin

        Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

        Friedrich von Schiller

        Rainer Maria Rilke

        Eduard Morike

        Theodor Fontane

I look over the names awhile.  “Dieter alone chose Remarque, von Hofmannsthal, and Mann.”

“Oh, I love Remarque too,” Gisela offers.  “I would have put him ninth.”

“One great novel after another,” Dieter says.  “All Quiet on the Western Front.  Spark of Life.  Three Comrades.  A Time to Love and a Time to Die.  The Black Obelisk.”       

“All great novels,” Gisela agrees.

“But why not von Hofmannsthal?” Dieter asks Gisela.  “His poetry is exquisite.  He wrote some fine plays.  His essays are excellent, and some are brilliant.  He wrote librettos with Strauss.  He was a Christian Neoplatonist and a true genius.”

She considers this.  “I’ll place him tenth on my list.”   

“And Gisela alone chose Hesse, Rilke, and Fontane,” I note.

“Hesse’s not bad at all,” Dieter responds.  “Ninth for me.”

“What about Rilke?” Gisela asks Dieter.  “He portrayed transcendental experiences with the grandeur they deserve.  He was lyrical, evocative, visionary, spiritual, and sublime.  A true genius.”

“Tenth,” says Dieter.

“All right,” I respond, “so both of you chose Goethe, Holderlin, Lessing, Morike, and Schiller.”

“Ah, what a constellation!” says Gisela.

“Germany’s best!” says Dieter.

“I’d like to do a play about one of these five.  Unless you want to consider the other two you both like.  Hesse or Mann.”

“One of the seven.  How interesting,” says Gisela.  “I think that Hesse and Mann are both too recent.”

“Great move, one of these seven,” says Dieter.  “Let’s do it.  Yes, Hesse and Mann are both too recent.  I doubt there’s even a good biography of either of them.”

“Very well,” I say.  “One of the remaining five.  Fit these five writers into some kind of context for me.”

“The best and most enduring German literature has always had something spiritual or at least cosmic in it,” Dieter observes.

“Mystical,” says Gisela, “and poetic.”

“And tragic,” says Dieter.

“I suppose that began with Klopstock in the mid-1700s,” says Gisela.  “Personal experience touched with the spiritual and even the Divine.”

“Which was taken to new heights of intellectual spiritual aspiration and realization by Holderlin,” says Dieter.

“What about Morike?” I ask.

“Morike is too minor a figure to write a play about,” Dieter remarks.

“That’s right,” says Gisela.   “And Goethe is too big.”

“I’d play Goethe well on stage,” claims Dieter.  “However, he’s too immense.  He’s a colossus, the first great global intellectual, or at least the first great intellectual for all of Europe.  He’s the culmination of the best of Western civilization up until his time.  He bestrides the sky.  How could we get an audience to relate to Goethe as a human being?  Besides, we’re performing Faust.  A play about Goethe would be redundant.”

“By that logic,” Gisela replies, “we can’t do a play about Lessing because we’re performing Nathan the Wise.”

“Schiller?” I ask. 

“Schiller was truly great, but you looked at Schiller when you looked at Lessing,” Dieter reminds me, “and you chose a play by Lessing over Schiller’s Don Carlos or his Intrigue and Love.”

I nod.  “I wasn’t sure an American audience in the 1950s would respond to Schiller.”

“And I’m not sure Schiller as a person is interesting enough for a play,” Gisela concludes.

“That leaves Holderlin,” I observe.

“Holderlin was fascinating,” says Gisela.  “Next to Goethe, Holderlin is the most interesting of these men.”

“Yes,” says Dieter.  “Holderlin had a beautiful soul and mind and then degenerated into madness.  It’d be an amazing experience to portray him on stage.  I’d love to play the role of Holderlin.”

“Are you casting yourself?” Gisela retorts.

“Vera will make the casting decisions,” I say.

“Hegel was Holderlin’s close friend until Holderlin went mad,” Dieter observes.  “Perhaps Hegel could be a character in the play.”

“Good,” says Gisela, “and you know what else?  Young Morike hung out with Holderlin after he went mad.  You might get Morike into your play too.”

“Tripling the case for this course of action,” Dieter replies.  Gisela nods.

“All right then,” I declare to them both, “let’s do a play about Friedrich Holderlin.”