SCHILLER, JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH VON (1759–1805)

SCHILLER, JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH VON (1759–1805), German dramatist, poet, historian, and philosopher. Born on 10 November 1759 in Marbach, in Württemberg, the only son of a low-ranking army officer, Schiller was educated from 1773 to 1780 at the military academy founded by Karl Eugen, duke of Württemberg (1728–1793). His first play, Die Räuber (1781; The robbers), premiered at the Mannheim National Theater in 1782. Forbidden by the duke to pursue his literary work, he absconded from Württemberg later that year, and after serving as resident playwright at Mannheim for one year, he moved to Dresden and Leipzig and then in 1787 to Weimar, home of several leading literary figures, chiefly Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. In 1789 he was appointed professor of history at the University of Jena, on the strength of his Geschichte des Abfalls der vereinigten Niederlande von der spanischen Regierung (History of the revolt of the United Netherlands from Spanish rule, 1787).

Schiller married Charlotte von Lengefeld in 1790. After a serious illness in 1791 he remained a semi-invalid for the rest of his life. In 1794 he formed a friendship and alliance with Goethe based on shared convictions about the enduring validity of classical principles in art and about the centrality of art as a human activity. Their correspondence, along with their joint essays and projects, had a lasting impact on German literary debate and practice. In 1799 Schiller moved from Jena to Weimar, and he died there on 9 May 1805.

Schiller's work as a poet and dramatist falls into two distinct periods: before 1789 and from the mid-1790s to his death. His first three plays, Die Räuber, Die Verschwörung des Fiesko zu Genua (1783; The conspiracy of Fiesko at Genoa), and Kabale und Liebe (1784; Intrigue and love) owe much in style and spirit to the short-lived but influential avantgarde literary movement of the 1770s, the Sturm und Drang. Written in vigorous prose and showing the impact of the Sturm und Drang generation's reception of William Shakespeare, the plays explore flawed idealism, the charismatic leader, social divisions, and the impatience of the young with the imperfections of the world. They also bear the imprint of Schiller's medical training at the military academy and in particular of his interest in the problem of mind-body relationships. His fourth play, Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien (1787; Don Carlos, infante of Spain), anticipates his later dramas in its use of blank verse and concern with historical and public themes.

The compositional difficulties Schiller encountered with Don Carlos provoked a creative crisis, and though he wrote two seminal poems in 1788, "Die Götter Griechenlandes" (The gods of Greece) and "Die Künstler" (The artists), he turned away for almost a decade from creative writing, with the purpose of clarifying his thoughts on art in general and tragedy in particular. In 1791 he turned to the German philosopher Immanuel Kant's philosophy. Kant's dualism, according to which human beings belong to the realm of nature but also partake through reason in the realm of freedom, became fundamental to Schiller's thinking on aesthetics, for he saw art as a means of reconciling the tensions between nature and reason. His theory of the sublime in tragedy claims that tragedy mediates an experience of transcendence derived from the awareness that human beings may assert their moral freedom even while being physically destroyed (see in particular "Über das Pathetische" [On tragic pity]). In his influential treatise Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen in einer Reihe von Briefen (1794; On the aesthetic education of man in a series of letters), he argues that beauty as "living form" symbolizes and helps bring about the ideal harmony of sense and spirit to which human beings aspire. His notion of beauty as play and of aesthetic semblance have been important in later discussions of aesthetics. His final major treatise, Über naive und sentimentalische Dichtung (1795; On naive and sentimental poetry), defines the problem of the modern ("sentimental") writer's divided consciousness.

During 1795 Schiller started again to write poetry. In 1799 he completed his greatest drama, Wallenstein (published 1800). A rapid succession of verse plays followed up to his death: Maria Stuart (1801; Mary Stuart), Die Jungfrau von Orleans (1802; The maid of Orleans), Die Braut vonMessina (1803; The bride of Messina), Wilhelm Tell (1804; William Tell), and Demetrius (unfinished). Each signals a new departure in style. Together they reflect Schiller's preoccupation with some of the pressing themes of the age of the French Revolution: legitimacy of government, conscience versus political calculation, and the individual within the tide of events. His later poetry encompasses the more popular in style (for example, his ballads and "Das Lied von der Glocke" ([The song of the bell]), but he also used poetry as a meditation on the nature of art (for example, in "Das Ideal und das Leben" [The ideal and life] and "Der Tanz" [The Dance]).

The action-filled plots, strong characters, and thrilling encounters of Schiller's plays have not only guaranteed their continued place on the world stage but have inspired numerous opera composers, Giuseppe Verdi being the most prominent.

See also Drama: German ; German Literature and Language ; Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Sources

Dewhurst, Kenneth, and Nigel Reeves. Friedrich Schiller, Medicine, Psychology and Literature: With the First English Edition of His Complete Medical and Psychological Writings. Berkeley, 1978.

Schiller, Friedrich. Don Carlos and Mary Stuart. Translated by Hilary Collier Sy-Quia. Adapted in verse drama by Peter Oswald. New York, 1996.

——. Five Plays. Translated by Robert David MacDonald. London, 1918.

——. On the Aesthetic Education of Man, in a Series of Letters. Edited by Elizabeth M. Wilkinson and Leonard A. Willoughby. Oxford and New York, 1967.

——. Schillers Werke. Nationalausgabe. Edited by Julius Petersen, Liselotte Blumenthal, et al.; from 1992 by Norbert Oellers. 44 vols. Weimar, 1943–.

——. Wallenstein. Translated by Charles E. Passage. New York, 1958.

——. Werke und Briefe. Edited by Otto Dann et al. 12 vols. Frankfurt am Main, 2000–.

——. Wilhelm Tell. Translated and edited by William F. Mainland. Chicago, 1972.

Secondary Sources

Koopmann, Helmut, ed. Schiller-Handbuch. Stuttgart, 1998.

Reed, T. J. Schiller. Oxford and New York, 1991.

Sharpe, Lesley. Friedrich Schiller: Drama, Thought and Politics. Cambridge, U.K., and New York, 1991.

Lesley Sharpe

Friedrich von Schiller

BORN: 1759, Marbach, Germany

DIED: 1805, Weimar, Germany

NATIONALITY: German

GENRE: Poetry, fiction, nonfiction

MAJOR WORKS:
The Robbers (1781)
Intrigue and Love (1784)
Wallenstein (1800)
Maria Stuart (1801)
Wilhelm Tell (1804)

Overview

To this day, many regard Friedrich Schiller as the greatest dramatist in all of German history. More brilliantly than any of his predecessors, he revealed the power of drama and poetry in expressing a philosophy that emphasized both his idealism and his concern for human freedom. Schiller was also esteemed as an adept lyricist and theoretician whose works are informed by his conviction that the writer should strive not only to entertain, but also to instruct and improve his audience.

Works in Biographical and Historical Context

Birth and Education Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller was born on November 10, 1759, in Mar-bach, Germany, to an army captain and an innkeeper's daughter. He initially wanted to be a clergyman and enrolled in the Latin School at Ludwigsburg in 1766. Against his parents' wishes, however, Schiller was drafted into the Karlsschule, an elite military academy, in 1773. Karlsschule was located in Stuttgart (a city in Württemberg) and was a rigidly disciplined academy established to train the sons of German army officers for public service. At the time, Germany remained fragmented into more than three hundred principalities, bishoprics, and free cities, including Württemberg. By this time, Prussia had emerged to first rank among the German territories, especially through the military brilliance of Frederick the Great, who ruled Prussia from 1740 until 1786.

At the Karlsschule, Schiller was educated in an intensely disciplined atmosphere, and, although he was being trained in medicine, Schiller spent much of his time secretly reading the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Seneca, and William Shakespeare, along with the revolutionary works of Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock. Even before he graduated in 1780 and was appointed a medical officer in the military of Duke Karl Eugen (who ruled Württemberg with an iron fist), Schiller had begun writing The Robbers (1781), his first dramatic work.

Poverty and Early Plays Though Schiller had completed his play, he was unable to find a publisher and eventually self-published despite his pitiful salary, beginning a cycle of debt that would characterize his entire early career. In 1782, Schiller attended the performance of The Robbers at a theater in Mannheim, a production that earned him both public acclaim and the wrath of Duke Eugen, who insisted that he work only on medical texts from then on. This conflict forced Schiller to flee Stuttgart in 1782, launching a period of financial deprivation and uncertainty.

Schiller was financially desperate, but not without acquaintances. A friend gave him a post at the Mannheim Theater in 1783, and he was offered generous financial assistance by patron and friend Christian Gottfried Körner. His appointment at the Mannheim lasted a single year because the management wanted drama that avoided the extravagances of Schiller's The Robbers and Intrigue and Love (1784), his next major play. Around the same time, Schiller founded the literary journal Rheinland Thalia. Appearing in the publication was his poem “An die Freude” (1786), which would later inspire Ludwig van Beethoven's “Ode to Joy” (from the last movement of his Ninth Symphony).

Literary Friendships Schiller continued his dramatic pursuits, publishing and producing several plays and completing Don Carlos, Infante of Spain in 1787. With its historical setting and its use of blank verse to explore a theme of love versus duty, this play would prove important to Schiller's dramatic development. It featured a noblewoman character based on his friend, Charlotte von Kalb. When Schiller visited Frau von Kalb at her Weimar home in 1787 after publishing the play, he met Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, a dramatist and poet of growing importance, who became his close friend and collaborator in classicism. Schiller launched into a period of productivity that ensured his fame and social position. Schiller's historical work on the revolt of the Netherlands against Spain (the 1568–1648 revolt of seventeen provinces in the Netherlands against the Spanish Empire, which controlled them), as well as Goethe's support, earned him a professorship in history at the University of Jena in 1789, a position he would hold for the next decade.

Early in 1790, Schiller married Charlotte von Lengefeld, also a gifted writer. He was named a nobleman in 1803. Around this time, he became interested in Immanuel Kant's aesthetic philosophy. He began to write philosophical treatises and poems, including “The Artists” (1789), a work in which he celebrates art as a power that could create world harmony, overcome human desire, and awaken the artist to the mystery and beauty of the universe. His 1796 essay “On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry” is considered the basis for modern poetry criticism. These philosophical musings would affect the remainder of Schiller's work and have a lasting impact on criticism and literature itself.

Late Work and Death After completing a tragic trilogy based on the Thirty Years War (the 1618–1648) war of religion between Protestants and Catholics fought mainly in Germany but involving most of the major powers in Europe) that critics have compared with the dramas of Shakespeare, Schiller's correspondence with Goethe flourished, and Schiller eventually joined Goethe in Weimar, which was known as the “German Athens” because its ruler, Karl August, had succeeded in making it a center of art and culture. Schiller's most popular play, Maria Stuart, was completed in 1800, and he wrote several other important plays during this time. In 1804, Schiller published his greatest literary achievement, Wilhelm Tell, a powerful blend of history and heroic fiction. Although he completed other works before his death, Schiller's literary output was interrupted by illness, and he died in Weimar on May 9, 1805.

Works in Literary Context

German Significance Though the reverence Germany has bestowed upon Schiller might seem excessive, the cultural, artistic, and historical opinion of the country that influenced his writing during the eighteenth century helps provide an explanation. Schiller's work surfaced at a time when art and literature were dominated by the immense accomplishments of English, French, and Italian artists and writers. Even the German language itself was the cause of considerable debate, as some scholars asserted that the German tongue was not fit to be an agent of literary expression. Schiller, however, proved that Germany could compete with—and in some ways surpass—the creative and intellectual achievements of any other country. He was greatly influenced in his work by the writers he favored while in school (Rousseau, Seneca, Shakespeare, and Klopstock), the German theater, history, and ideas of natural philosophy as well as his friendship with Goethe.

Sturm und Drang The overemphasis on reason in the Age of Enlightenment led to a reaction in favor of the emotional and imaginative aspects of human personality and personal freedom. The result was the Sturm und Drang, or “Storm and Stress,” movement that swept German literature in the late eighteenth century. This literary tendency, characterized by passion, turbulence, and melodrama, was embraced by both Schiller and Goethe early in their writing careers.

LITERARY AND HISTORICAL CONTEMPORARIES

Schiller's famous contemporaries include:

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832): This German poet and philosopher was Schiller's close friend. It was Schiller who encouraged Goethe to continue with his work on Faust (1808, 1832) after he had abandoned the future masterpiece.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791): This Austrian composer was hailed for his large musical output as well as his musical genius. His compositions include the “Paris” Symphony (1778) and the opera The Marriage of Figaro (1786).

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790): A founding father of the United States, Franklin was also a prolific writer and inventor. His publications include Poor Richard's Alma-nack (1733–1758).

Christoph Martin Wieland (1733–1813): The German author wrote both the educational novel Geschichte des Agathon (1766–1767) and the romantic poem Oberon (1780). He also collaborated with both Goethe and Schiller in Weimar.

Maria Gaetana Agnesi (1718–1799): This Italian mathematician was known for her solution to an algebraic equation and wrote the first book that discussed both differential calculus and integral calculus. Her books include Instituzioni analitiche ad uso della gioventu italiana (1748).

Denmark Vesey (1767–1822): This West Indian slave plotted a rebellion in Charleston, South Carolina, and along the Carolina coast, which was supposed to happen on July 14, 1822. The plan failed, and he was convicted and hanged for his role in the conspiracy.

Central to Schiller's first three dramas is the question of freedom: The Robbers, in which the play's hero escapes corrupt society by fleeing to the Bohemian forests and becomes a type of German Robin Hood; Fiesco; or, The Genoese Conspiracy (1783), a tragedy with the theme of struggle against oppression; and Intrigue and Love, another tragedy that calls for freedom of the individual amidst political and social opposition. Schiller's Sturm und Drang work, however, mellowed with age, and his later pieces are well-planned, reasoned, and articulate expressions of neoclassical ideals and philosophical exploration.

Innovations in Drama Published in 1787, Don Carlos marks Schiller's break with his youthful rebellion and his movement toward German classicism. During this shift, Schiller established the tradition of a new type of drama, the Ideendrama, or drama of ideas. Don Carlos also set a precedent for the verse form of the German classical drama: Shakespearean blank verse. Schiller's intent in the play was to concentrate his passion for morality in a more theatrically dramatic—as opposed to reactive—fashion in order to present the tragic defeat of idealism by conspiracy and deception. While Don Carlos does contain Sturm und Drang subject matter, it is overshadowed by the play's elements of classical tragedy.

Legacy Though Schiller has tended to fall under the shadow of Goethe, his famous friend, he continues to hold an important place in German literature. Schiller's intellectual superiority and creative passion were cause for national pride; for instance, his birthday was declared a national holiday, streets and schools were named after him, and his works were adopted as part of Germany's educational curriculum. Schiller's appeal has continued in part because of his association with great music, having inspired Beethoven's “Ode to Joy” and operas by Rossini and Verdi. Thinkers such as Carl Gustav Jung, Friederich Nietzsche, Friederich Hegel, and Karl Marx were also indebted to the ideas Schiller set forth in his philosophical and aesthetical works.

Works in Critical Context

National Icon Schiller's reputation as a boldly original thinker and artist was established with his controversial but highly successful first play, The Robbers. With the production of The Minister, he was recognized as one of the great masters of German drama. During his lifetime, he was lauded as one of the figures who raised the stature of German literature. Critics marveled at his ability to portray with immediacy and complexity human suffering and the triumph of the human spirit. He was regarded as a national icon on his death, and the attention paid to his works by German literary critics is comparable to Shakespeare in the English-speaking world.

In the nineteenth century, critics admired Schiller's taste and feeling and his concern for human freedom. Contemporary critics have suggested that Schiller's dramas are less accessible to modern readers due to their flamboyant, sometimes bombastic language. Nevertheless, most commentators agree that Schiller's themes and concerns, including political and individual freedom, the complexity of human endeavor, and the struggle between the rational and sensual aspects of the self are remarkably prescient of twentiethand twenty-first-century concerns. Contemporary critics also tend to stress the philosophical underpinnings of Schiller's plays and poetry as well as the political themes in his works.

Wilhelm Tell Since its debut in 1804, Wilhelm Tell has remained a work that is frequently performed and read. Critic H. B. Garland believes that Wilhelm Tell is “probably Schiller's most popular play, rich in qualities which no other of his works displays in equal degree,” although, according to W. G. Moore, evaluation of the work “really rests upon a decision as to whether Schiller was predominantly a thinker, writing to present an argument about freedom, or a dramatist, presenting a case of notable conflict and a revelation of the mystery of life.” Whatever their approach, critics continue to praise Schiller's ability to control the dramatic action of Wilhelm Tell through characterization, setting, and language.

COMMON HUMAN EXPERIENCE

Schiller's plays often drew on historical events for both content and emotion. Here are a few examples of other writings based on historical events:

A Tale of Two Cities (1859), a novel by Charles Dickens. This well-known classic portrays human involvement in the events leading up to the bloody French Revolution.

Kristin Lavransdatter (1920), a novel by Sigrid Undset. Filled with dramatic events, romantic intrigue, and political conspiracy, this work helped win its author the 1928 Nobel Prize.

The Other Boleyn Girl (2003), a novel by Philippa Gregory. This work of historical fiction is told from the perspective of Anne Boleyn's sister Mary, who was King Henry VIII's mistress before he married Anne.

Braveheart (1995), a film directed by Mel Gibson. This movie depicts life and war in thirteenth-century Scotland.

Responses to Literature

1. Though Schiller's importance is now widely recognized, he was better known as Goethe's contemporary for many years. Select another famous literary friendship and analyze in an essay how the relationship affected each writer's work, as well as how each other's work affected their relationship.
2. Schiller's work inspired important pieces of music, from Beethoven's “Ode to Joy” to Rossini's William Tell Overture. Find at least three other pieces of music—any style, any time period—that were inspired by literature and create a presentation of your findings. Do you think adapting an existing text to song form makes for a successful piece of music?
3. Schiller's discovery of Immanuel Kant greatly influenced his later work. What were Kant's primary beliefs? How might these have influenced Schiller's writings? Write an essay that outlines your conclusions.
4. Schiller moved from romantic poetry to a quieter and more measured style as he grew older. Compare the early and later works of one of your favorite authors in a paper. What criteria would you use to assess the different bodies of work?
5. Schiller was rescued from poverty by the patronage of a friend. In a paper, address these questions: How would the lack of a patron affect an author's literary output? What benefits does patronage provide? What solutions would you suggest for an aspiring artist who does not have a patron?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

Carlyle, Thomas. The Life of Friedrich Schiller. London: Camden House, 1992.

Garland, H. B. Schiller: The Dramatic Writer. Oxford: Clarendon, 1969.

Stahl, Ernst L. Friedrich Schiller's Drama: Theory andPractice. Oxford: Clarendon, 1954.

Witte, W. Schiller. Oxford: Blackwell, 1949.

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller

The German dramatist, poet, and historian Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller (1759-1805) ranks as one of the greatest of German literary figures. He was a founder of modern German literature.

Friedrich von Schiller was born at Marbach, Württemberg, on Nov. 10, 1759. His father, Johann Kaspar Schiller, was an army captain in the service of Duke Karl Eugen of Württemberg. His mother, Elisabeth Dorothea, the daughter of a Marbach innkeeper, was a gentle and religious person. Schiller had four sisters, one older and three younger.

As a boy, Schiller, under the influence of Philipp Ulrich Moser, a parson, wanted to become a preacher. He attended the duke's military academy, the Karlsschule, near Stuttgart for two years. After the academy was moved to Stuttgart, Schiller endured five more years of harsh discipline there. He studied medicine because that was the domineering duke's will. In spite of frequent illnesses, fevers, stomach upsets, and headaches, he wrote his final dissertation on the interrelationship between man's spiritual and physical natures. At the same time he was writing his first play, Die Räuber, which was published in 1781. It ranks as one of the literary monuments of the German Sturm und Drang period.

Early Works

In December 1780 Schiller was appointed medical officer to a regiment stationed in Stuttgart at a pitiably low salary. A loan toward the publication of Die Räuber marked the beginning of a succession of agonizing debts that characterized Schiller's early career. In 1782 Die Räuber received its first stage performance, in Mannheim. It brought him both public acclaim and the wrath of the duke, who forbade him to write anything except medical treatises. That same year Schiller published the Laura-Odenin his Anthologie auf das Jahr 1782. The inspiration for these poems was a 30-year-old widow, Dorothea Vischer, who had three children. She had rented a simple ground-floor room to Schiller and another lieutenant.

Meantime, Schiller's conflict with the Duke of Württemberg forced him to flee Stuttgart in September 1782. A period of great deprivation and uncertainty followed until Schiller became dramatist at the Mannheim theater in September 1783. During this time he composed Die Verschwörung des Fiesko zu Genua (1783) and Kabale und Liebe (1784). He also began work on Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien, which appeared in 1785 and in its revised form in 1787.

In 1784 Schiller completed Die Schaubühne als moralische Anstalt betrachtet, which appeared in his Rheinische Thalia, a literary journal, in 1785. The second issue of Thaliacontained Schiller's hymn An die Freude, which later inspired Ludwig van Beethoven to create his magnificent Ninth Symphony in D Minor. In the third issue of Thalia Schiller published part of Don Carlos. During this period Christian Gottfried Körner generously offered Schiller financial help and hospitality, becoming his patron and friend.

Don Carlos was important in Schiller's dramatic development not only for its use of a historical setting but also for its employment of blank verse. For the first time, too, Schiller accomplished the presentation of a perfectly drawn and perfectly convincing noblewoman. The character of Queen Elisabeth of Valois was to some extent based on that of Charlotte von Kalb, an intimate friend.

Schiller occupied himself for many years afterward with the themes he employed in this drama. In Don Carlos the conflict between love and the demands of the state was exalted into the idea of the dignity and freedom of man. The struggle against love is a struggle for a high goal, and it is not the love of Don Carlos for the Queen or his friendship for the Marquis of Posa that forms the crux of the play but the ideal of spiritual and national freedom.

In all of Schiller's earliest tragedies—Die Räuber, Die Verschwörung des Fiesko, and Kabale und Liebe—he presents either a great criminal, a great adventurer, or a great enthusiast. All of his characters speak in the grand style. Schiller captures the secret of great passion even in his earliest dramas. The robber chieftain Karl Moor of Die Räuber judges himself when he admits that two men like him would destroy the organic structure of the civilized world. Fiesko contemplates the idea that it is great to win a crown but that it is divine to be able to cast it off.

In 1787 Schiller paid a visit to his friend Frau von Kalb in Weimar, the residence of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who at that time was traveling in Italy. The two great German poets met the following year in the house of Frau von Lengefeld (later to be Schiller's mother-in-law) in Rudolstadt. They had met once before, in December 1779, when Duke Karl August of Weimar and Goethe had come to the Karlsschule in Stuttgart to award the annual student prizes. Schiller had received three silver medals.

In 1788 Schiller's poems Die Götter Griechenlands and Die Künstler appeared, and that same year he published Geschichte des Abfalls der vereinigten Niederlande, a history of the revolt of the Netherlands against Spain. These works assured Schiller's fame and social position. Together with Goethe's support they gained him a professorship of history at the University of Jena in 1789. He held this position for 10 years. Schiller's inaugural, Was heisst und zu welchem Ende studiert man Universalgeschichte, caused a sensation. Afterward more than 500 students paid homage to the poet, but at later lectures the number of students in attendance dwindled considerably. Early in 1790 Schiller married Charlotte von Lengefeld, a gifted writer. In February 1803 he was created a nobleman.

Esthetic Theory

After 1790 Schiller became intensely interested in the philosophy and esthetics of Immanuel Kant. His Geschichte des Dreissigjährigen Krieges, a history of the Thirty Years War, appeared in 1791-1792. His studies in esthetics accompanied his historical researches. Schiller strove to capture the essence of "freedom and art." He determined not to read the works of any modern writer for 2 years. In his poem Die Götter Griechenlands Schiller had looked upon Greece with the eyes of Johann Joachim Winckelmann, the classical archeologist and historian of ancient art. Under the influence of Winckelmann's conception of the "schöne Antike," Schiller became convinced that only art can ennoble the barbarian and bring him culture. Art became, for Schiller, in the Platonic sense a basis of education. In 1795 he wrote in his Ü ber die aesthetische Erziehung des Menschen, "There is no other way to make the sensuous man rational and reasonable than by first making him esthetic." The iron necessity of man's daily existence degraded him, said Schiller, and utility became the idol of the masses. But by means of the esthetic form man can "annihilate" the material aspects of life and triumph over transient matter. Man thus becomes the creator of a pure and permanent world.

In his grandiose philosophic poem Die Künstler, Schiller venerated art as the ennobling power that can create a higher culture and disclose a world harmony. In the opening strophe of this work, man, standing on the threshold of a new century, is depicted as the master of nature. He is shown as free, enlightened, strong through laws, great in his gentleness, matured through time, proud, and manly. Art, said Schiller, teaches man how to overcome his desires. Art is the first step away from the bondage of the flesh into a realm where the nobility of the soul reigns. The artist frees form from material in the same manner that waves separate a reflection from its source. In nature the artist discovers the laws of beauty. For example, in a tree he perceives the form of a pillar, and in the crescent moon the artist becomes aware of the mystery of the universe. For Schiller reality was merely illusion; only in the higher, spiritual realm was truth to be found. Just as the stage had changed into a tribunal in his famous poem Die Kraniche des Ibykus, so to him true art changes into higher reality.

Schiller wrote his important essay in esthetics, Ü ber naive und sentimentalische Dichtung, in 1795-1796. It forms the basis of modern poetry criticism. In it Schiller points out that the "naive" poet has an advantage over other poets in his powerful, sensitive, and inherent clarity, while the "sentimentalische" poet has an advantage in his power of moral enthusiasm. By now Schiller had reached an artistic maturity incompatible with moralizing. In his philosophical poem Das Ideal und das Leben (1795) the poet presents no clumsy didactic lesson. No mention of reward or recompense for the sufferer, or of moral striving after inner freedom, is made. The subject of this poem is purely the growth of a powerful personality beyond the confines of the self into a higher world.

Later Dramas

In 1798-1799 Schiller completed his great trilogy on Albrecht von Wallenstein, the condottiere of the Thirty Years War. These three plays—Wallensteins Lager, Piccolomini, and Wallensteins Tod—represent Schiller's most powerful tragedy. In them he comes nearest to the tragic grandeur of William Shakespeare and Heinrich von Kleist. The Wallenstein plays stress Schiller's view of man as a creative force, and they exhibit his concept of historical inevitability. Schiller ennobles Wallenstein as a great creative statesman who bows before inexorable fate. Wallenstein recognizes his guilt and acknowledges the justice of his end because he realizes that every evil deed brings with it its angel of revenge.

The famous literary friendship between Goethe and Schiller began in earnest in 1794. On July 20, 1794, after a meeting in Jena of a nature society of which both were honorary members, Goethe went to Schiller's house to continue a discussion on the interpretation of natural phenomena, the metamorphosis of plants, and the interrelationship or separation between idea and experience. Goethe believed he had "observed with his own eyes" tangible truths of nature that Schiller, however, called "ideas." An important correspondence between the two poets followed. Schiller enjoyed the friendship of Goethe, with whom he began editing the literary journals Horen (1795-1797) and Musenalmanach (1796-1800). Goethe's residence in Weimar was a main reason for Schiller's move there, from Jena with his family, in 1799. During his Weimar years Schiller created many of his finest plays and poems.

Schiller wrote his most popular play, Maria Stuart, in 1800. He employed tragic irony as an artistic means in the memorable scene between the two queens in which Mary speaks daggers to Elizabeth but is hoist with her own petard. Mary remains a noble and tragic character right up to the scaffold. As with Elizabeth, the decisive factor in her fate lies in her personality and not in politics. Mary's death is subject not to "poetic justice" but to the justice of human conscience. By her death she atones for a previous guilt.

Schiller's next play, Die Jungfrau von Orleans (1801), is his poetically richest drama. Its theme is again guilt and redemption. Compared to Maria Stuart, it is loosely constructed, diffuse, and romantic not only in regard to the material itself but also in regard to the poetic character of the heroine. On the other hand, Die Braut von Messina (1803) is compact and stylized. Artistry dominates it at the cost of poetry. This play reflects Schiller's interest in classical antiquity. Its chorus has passages of lyrical and rhetorical magnificence.

In the preface to the first edition of this play, Schiller explained his views on the function of the chorus. The chorus, he wrote, should not be an accompaniment to the drama as in some ancient plays. Rather it should bring out the poetry of the play, thereby converting the modern world into a poetic one. The chorus should express the depth of mankind, and it should be a judging and clarifying witness of the actions in that it reflects them and endows them with spiritual power.

Schiller revealed his technical mastery at its most supreme in Wilhelm Tell (1804). Although this play is stylized, its artistry is less obvious than that of Die Braut von Messina. Schiller created the character of Wilhelm Tell as a manly hero without making him into a leader. When Gessler, the governor, brutally interferes with life and nature, the Swiss, and with them Wilhelm Tell, fight for family and freedom. In this play Schiller for once placed history and hero in favorable conjunction.

In the fragmentary drama Demetrius, Schiller unfolds a mysterious fate, revealing through his analytical dramatic technique a past crime more terrible to contemplate than any dread of the future. Whereas Oedipus in the hands of Sophocles subjects himself to divine command, Schiller's Demetrius defies his fate in order to perish.

Schiller's final tragedies are concerned with man's profoundest experience, the assertion and attainment of free will despite bodily claims or passion. After months of intermittent illness, Schiller died in Weimar on May 9, 1805.

Further Reading

An early biography of Schiller is Thomas Carlyle, The Life of Friedrich Schiller (1825; 2d ed. 1845). Of the many critical biographies see William Witte, Schiller (1949) and Schiller and Burns (1959). Other useful studies include Henry B. Garland's three works, Schiller (1949), Schiller Revisited (1959), and Schiller: The Dramatic Writer (1969); Ernst L. Stahl, Friedrich Schiller's Drama: Theory and Practice (1954); William F. Mainland, Schiller and the Changing Past (1957); and the essay on Schiller in Thomas Mann, Last Essays (trans. 1959). Other useful studies are Stanley S. Kerry, Schiller's Writings on Aesthetics (1961); Elizabeth M. Wilkinson and L. A. Willoughby, eds., Schiller: On the Aesthetic Education of Man, in a Series of Letters (trans. 1967), which has an extensive introduction about Schiller along with some of his works; and John Martin Ellis, Schiller's Kalliasbriefe and the Study of His Aesthetic Theory (1969). For a discussion of Sturm and Drang and Weimar classicism see the relevant chapters in Ernst L. Stahl and W. E. Yuill, Introductions to German Literature, vol. 3: German Literature of the 18th and 19th Centuries, edited by August Closs (1970). □

Schiller, Johann Christoph Friedrich von (1759–1805) German dramatist, historian, and philosopher. His early blank verse plays, such as The Robbers (1781) and Don Carlos (1787), are classics of the Sturm und Drang period. Schiller's aesthetic and philosophical ideas were influenced by the idealism of Kant. His masterpiece is the trilogy Wallenstein (1800). Other historical plays include Mary Stuart (1801), Maid of Orleans (1801), and William Tell (1804). Schiller's “Ode to Joy” forms the finale of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

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