Halm, Friedrich (Cracow, 1806-71, Vienna), pseudonym and customary designation of Eligius Franz Joseph, Freiherr von Münch-Bellinghausen. The family moved to Vienna in 1811, and the young Münch was educated at the monastery school at Melk, the Schottengymnasium in Vienna (1816-22), where N. Lenau and E. Bauernfeld were schoolfellows, and Vienna University. In 1826 he married a young noblewoman, Sophie von Schloißnigg, and in the same year he received a probationary civil service appointment, rising to senior rank in 1840 Münch first used the pseudonym Friedrich Halm in 1834, and his first stage success, Griseldis (1837), took place at the Burgtheater, Vienna, under this name in 1835. The performance of the actress Julie Rettich in the title role was the beginning of a lifelong friendship between her and Halm. His plays, which were regularly accepted by the Burgtheater, were mostly designed to provide her with a suitable and important part. The tragedy Der Adept (1838) was performed in 1836, the one-act play Camoens (1838) in 1837, Imelda Lambertazzi (1842) in 1838, and Ein mildes Urteil (1857) in 1840 König und Bauer (performed 1841) is an adaptation of a play by Lope de Vega (El villano en su rincón). A particular success was Der Sohn der Wildnis (1843), produced in 1842; the tragedies Sampiero (1857) and Donna Maria de Molina and the comedy Verbot und Befehl (1857), performed respectively in 1844, 1847, and 1848, made little mark. In 1844, to the bitter disillusionment of Grillparzer, who was a candidate, Halm was appointed custodian of the Court Library (Hofbibliothek, now Nationalbibliothek) in Vienna. In 1854 the anonymous verse tragedy Der Fechter von Ravenna was performed in Vienna and elsewhere. Authorship was claimed in 1855 by a Bavarian schoolmaster named Bacherl, and a cause célèbre developed, which was not immediately ended by Halm's declaration in 1856 that he was the author. The play remained a considerable stage success. The classical Iphigenie in Delphi (1864) was not well received in the theatre in 1856. Halm's last stage works were Wildfeuer (‘dramatisches Gedicht’, 1864) and the Indian tragedy Begum Somru (1872), in which Warren Hastings is one of the characters. Both were produced in the 1860s.
Halm, to whom honours came easily, was appointed in 1867 Intendant of the two Court theatres (Oper and Burgtheater), and immediately clashed with the Burgtheater director, H. Laube, by arrogating to himself choice of play and engagement and casting of actors. Laube resigned, and, realizing that the task of directing the theatres was beyond him, Halm himself abandoned his post in 1870. He published 2 vols. of poetry (Gedichte, 1850, and Neue Gedichte, 1864). Of his stories, the best known is Die Marzipanliese (1856).
A characteristic figure of the mid-century in Vienna, Halm embodied the advantages of privilege and financial security. His poetic writing is a self-conscious tribute to an ideal of beauty, which excluded all that was crass or harsh, and enveloped its serenity or melancholy in uniformly mellifluous verse. Though in his own day he was rated among the great, his reputation had paled by the end of the century and has not since been revived.
Halm's complete writings (Werke, 12 vols.) appeared between 1856 and 1872.
The Oxford Companion to German Literature. Copyright © 1976, 1986, 1997, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
