GUSTAV FREYTAG

(1816-1895)

USTAV FREYTAG, one of the foremost of German novelists, was born July 13th, 1816, in Kreuzburg, Silesia, where his father was a physician. He studied alternately at Breslau and Berlin, at which latter university he was given the degree of a doctor of philosophy in 1838. In 1839 he settled as a privatdocent at the University of Breslau, where he lectured on the German language and literature until 1844, when he resigned his position to devote himself to literature. He removed to Leipzig in 1846, and the following year to Dresden, where he married. In 1848 he returned to Leipzig to edit with Julian Schmidt the weekly journal Die Grenzboten, which he conducted until 1861, and again from 1869 to 1870. In 1867 he became Liberal member for Erfurt in the North German Reichstag. In 1870, on the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian war, he was attached to the staff of the Crown Prince, later the German Emperor Frederick III., and remained in service until after the battle of Sedan. Subsequently to 1870 his journalistic work was chiefly for the newly established weekly periodical Im Neuen Reich. In 1879 he retired from public life and afterward lived in Wiesbaden, except for the summer months, which he spent on his estate Siebleben near Gotha. He died at Wiesbaden, April 30th, 1895.

All of Freytag's earliest work, with the single exception of a volume of poems published in 1845 under the title 'In Breslau,' is dramatic. His first production was a comedy, 'Die Brautfahrt' (The Wedding Journey), published in 1844, which although it was awarded. a prize offered by the Royal Theatre in Berlin, found but indifferent popular favor, as did its successor, the one-act tragedy Die Gelehrte' (The Scholar). With his next play, 'Die Valentine' (1846), Freytag however was signally successful. This was followed the year after by Graf Waldemar.' He attained his highest dramatic success with the comedy Die Journalisten' (The Journalists), which appeared in 1853, and since its first production in 1854 has maintained its place as one of the most popular plays on the German stage. But one other play followed, the tragedy Die Fabier' (The Fabii), which appeared in 1859.

He had begun in the mean time his career as a novelist with his most famous novel, Soll und Haben' (Debit and Credit), which was