Biedermeier - Literature

Literature

The term "Biedermeier" appeared first in literary circles in the form of a pseudonym, Gottlieb Biedermaier, which was used by the country doctor Adolf Kussmaul and lawyer Ludwig Eichrodt in poems that the duo had printed in the Munich Fliegende Blätter ("Flying Sheets"). The verses parodied the poems of the era as depoliticized and petit-bourgeois. The name was constructed from the titles of two poems ("Biedermanns Abendgemütlichkeit" (Biedermann's Evening Comfort) and "Bummelmaiers Klage" (Bummelmaier's Complaint)) that Joseph Victor von Scheffel had published in 1848 in the same magazine. As a label for the epoch, the term has been used since around 1900.

Due to the strict control of publication and official censorship, Biedermeier writers primarily concerned themselves with non-political subjects, like historical fiction and country life. Political discussion was usually confined to the home, in the presence of close friends.

Typical Biedermeier poets are Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, Adelbert von Chamisso, Friedrich Halm, Eduard Mörike, and Wilhelm Müller, the last two of which have well-known musical settings by Hugo Wolf and Franz Schubert respectively. Adalbert Stifter is a novelist and short story writer whose work also reflects the concerns of the Biedermeier movement, particularly with his novel, Der Nachsommer. As Carl Schorske puts it, "To illustrate and propagate his concept of Bildung, compounded of Benedictine world piety, German humanism, and Biedermeier conventionality, Stifter gave to the world his novel Der Nachsommer".