KOTZEBUE

kotzebue, august friedrich ferdinand von (1761-1819), german dramatist, was born on the 3rd of may, 1761, at weimar. after attending the gymnasium of his native town, he went in his sixteenth year to the university of jena, and afterwards studied about a year in duisburg. in 1780 he completed his legal course and was admitted an advocate. through the influence of graf gortz, prussian ambassador at the russian court, he became secretary of the governor-general of st petersburg. in 1783 he received the appointment of assessor to the high court of appeal in reval, where he married the daughter of a russian lieutenant-general. he was ennobled in 1785, and became president of the magistracy of the province of esthonia. in reval he acquired considerable reputation by his novels, _die leiden der ortenbergischen familie_ (1785) and _geschichte meines vaters_ (1788), and still more by the plays _adelheid von wulfingen_ (1789), _menschenhass und reue_ (1790) and _die indianer in england_ (1790). the good impression produced by these works was, however, almost effaced by a cynical dramatic satire, _doktor bahrdt mit der eisernen stirn_, which appeared in 1790 with the name of knigge on the title-page. after the death of his first wife kotzebue retired from the russian service, and lived for a time in paris and mainz; he then settled in 1795 on an estate which he had acquired near reval and gave himself up to literary work. within a few years he published six volumes of miscellaneous sketches and stories (_die jungsten kinder meiner laune_, 1793-1796) and more than twenty plays, the majority of which were translated into several european languages. in 1798 he accepted the office of dramatist to the court theatre in vienna, but owing to differences with the actors he was soon obliged to resign. he now returned to his native town, but as he was not on good terms with goethe, and had openly attacked the romantic school, his position in weimar was not a pleasant one. he had thoughts of returning to st petersburg, and on his journey thither he was, for some unknown reason, arrested at the frontier and transported to siberia. fortunately he had written a comedy which flattered the vanity of the emperor paul i.; he was consequently speedily brought back, presented with an estate from the crown lands of livonia, and made director of the german theatre in st petersburg. he returned to germany when the emperor paul died, and again settled in weimar; he found it, however, as impossible as ever to gain a footing in literary society, and turned his steps to berlin, where in association with garlieb merkel (1769-1850) he edited _der freimutige_ (1803-1807) and began his _almanach dramatischer spiele_ (1803-1820). towards the end of 1806 he was once more in russia, and in the security of his estate in esthonia wrote many satirical articles against napoleon in his journals _die biene_ and _die grille_. as councillor of state he was attached in 1816 to the department for foreign affairs in st petersburg, and in 1817 went to germany as a kind of spy in the service of russia, with a salary of 15,000 roubles. in a weekly journal (_literarisches wochenblatt_) which he published in weimar he scoffed at the pretensions of those germans who demanded free institutions, and became an object of such general dislike that he was obliged to move to mannheim. he was especially detested by the young enthusiasts for liberty, and one of them, karl ludwig sand, a theological student, stabbed him, in mannheim, on the 23rd of march 1819. sand was executed, and the government made his crime an excuse for placing the universities under strict supervision. besides his plays, kotzebue wrote several historical works, which, however, are too one-sided and prejudiced to have much value. of more interest are his autobiographical writings, _meine flucht nach paris im winter_ 1790 (1791), _uber meinen aufenthalt in wien_ (1799), _das merkwurdigste jahr meines lebens_ (1801), _erinnerungen aus paris_ (1804), and _erinnerungen von meiner reise aus liefland nach rom und neapel_ (1805). as a dramatist he was extraordinarily prolific, his plays numbering over 200; his popularity, not merely on the german, but on the european stage, was unprecedented. his success, however, was due less to any conspicuous literary or poetic ability than to an extraordinary facility in the invention of effective situations; he possessed, as few german playwrights before or since, the unerring instinct for the theatre; and his influence on the _technique_ of the modern drama from scribe to sardou and from bauernfeld to sudermann is unmistakable. kotzebue is to be seen to best advantage in his comedies, such as _der wildfang_, _die beiden klingsberg_ and _die deutschen kleinstadter_, which contain admirable genre pictures of german life. these plays held the stage in germany long after the once famous _menschenhass und reue_ (known in england as _the stranger_), _graf benjowsky_, or ambitious exotic tragedies like _die sonnenjungfrau_ and _die spanier in peru_ (which sheridan adapted as _pizarro_) were forgotten. two collections of kotzebue's dramas were published during his lifetime: _schauspiele_ (5 vols., 1797); _neue schauspiele_ (23 vols., 1798-1820). his _samtliche dramatische werke_ appeared in 44 vols., in 1827-1829, and again, under the title _theater_, in 40 vols., in 1840-1841. a selection of his plays in 10 vols, appeared at leipzig in 1867-1868. cp. h. doring, _a. von kotzebues leben_ (1830); w. von kotzebue, _a. von kotzebue_ (1881); ch. rabany, _kotzebue, sa vie et son temps_ (1893); w. sellier, _kotzebue in england_ (1901).