Friedrich Schiller, 1759-1805
Biographical note
German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright. Schiller is considered by most Germans to be Germany's most important classical playwright. Critics like F.J. Lamport and Eric Auerbach have noted his innovative use of dramatic structure and his creation of new forms, such as the melodrama and the bourgeois tragedy.
During the last seventeen years of his life (1788–1805), Schiller struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang Goethe, with whom he frequently discussed issues concerning aesthetics and encouraged Goethe to finish works he left merely as sketches; this relationship and these discussions led to a period now referred to as Weimar Classicism.
Works
Plays
- The Robbers (Die Räuber) [1781]
- Fiesco; or, the Genoese Conspiracy (Die Verschwörung des Fiesco zu Genua) [1783]
- Love and Intrigue (Kabale und Liebe) [1784]
- Don Carlos (Don Karlos, Infant von Spanien) [1787]
- Wallenstein [1800]
- The Maid of Orleans (Die Jungfrau von Orleans) [1801]
- Mary Stuart (Maria Stuart) [1801]
- Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx [1802]
- The Bride of Messina (Die Braut von Messina) [1803], and On the Use of the Chorus in Tragedy
- Wilhelm Tell (William Tell) [1804]
- Wilhelm Tell
- Demetrius (unfinished at his death)
Histories
- The Revolt of the Netherlands (Geschichte des Abfalls der vereinigten Niederlande von der Spanischen Regierung)
- A History of the Thirty Years' War (Geschichte des dreissigjährigen Kriegs)
- The Thirty Years War
- On the Barbarian Invasions, Crusaders and Middle Ages (Über Völkerwanderung, Kreuzzüge und Mittelalter)
Translations
- Euripides, Iphigenia in Aulis
- William Shakespeare, Macbeth
- Jean Racine, Phèdre
Prose
- The Ghost-Seer; or the Apparitionist (Der Geisterseher) [unfinished novel, started in 1786, and published periodically; published as book in 1789]
- The Sport of Destiny [fragment]
- On the Aesthetic Education of Man in a series of Letters (Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen in einer Reihe von Briefen) [1794]
- Dishonoured Irreclaimable (Der Verbrecher aus verlorener Ehre) [1786]
- Aesthetical Essays of Frederich Schiller
- Philosophical Letters of Frederich Schiller
Poems
- An die Freude or Ode to Joy [1785] [the basis for the fourth movement of Beethoven's ninth symphony]
- The Artists
- The Hostage [which Schubert set to music]
- The Cranes of Ibykus
- Song of the Bell
- Columbus
- Hope
- Pegasus in Harness
- The Glove
- Nänie [which Brahms set to music]
- The Poems of Schiller — First period
- The Poems of Schiller — Second period
- The Poems of Schiller — Suppressed poems
- The Poems of Schiller — Third period
