Ricarda Huch

Ricarda Huch (1864-1947), German novelist, poet, and cultural historian, won renown as a talented writer in several genres.

Ricarda Huch was born in Brunswick (Braunschweig) on Aug. 18, 1864, the daughter of a merchant. She became the first female student admitted to the University of Zurich at a time when women could not study at any German university; she obtained her doctorate in history in 1892. The next years she spent working first as a librarian in Zurich and later as a schoolteacher in Bremen. Her Swiss experiences she later described in a charming book of memoirs, Frühling in der Schweiz (1938).

Huch's first creative phase (1890-1900) is marked by several volumes of lyrical poetry written in neoromantic style: Gedichte (1891) and Neue Gedichte (1907), both later issued under the title Liebeslyrik (1913). Their central theme is that of her love for her cousin Richard Huch, whom she married in 1907 after divorcing her first husband, an Italian dentist, Ermanno Ceconi. Her second marriage lasted only 3 years.

Huch's first novel was a highly romantic book on which her early fame rested: Erinnerrungen von Ludolf Ursleu dem Jüngeren (1892). Aus der Triumphgasse (1902) mixes realistic and romantic elements in describing the slum districts of Trieste. But her basic theme, the will to live, finds expression here and in her next novel, Vita somnium breve (1903).

Huch won prominence during the years 1902 to 1910 as a master of the historical novel. Best known are two brilliant works dealing with the romantic period in German history: Blütezeit der Romantik (1899) and Ausbreitung und Verfall der Romantik (1902). Several of her books from this period center on the theme of the unification of Italy in the 19th century: Die Geschichten von Garibaldi (1906-1907), Die Verteidigung Roms (1906), and Der Kampf um Rom (1907). Later she turned to the historical works that assure her a lasting place in the history of German letters: Her trilogy, Deutsche Geschichte (1912-1949), deals respectively with Germany during the Thirty Years War, the Reformation, and the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire. Lighter works include a successful series of novellen (short tales) and a psychological detective novel, Der Fall Daruga (1917).

At the time of Hitler's rise to power in Germany the writer was one of her country's most respected members of the Preussische Dichterakademie (Academy of Prussian Writers). However, in protest to Hitler's dictatorship, she refused to join the newly founded Nazi Academy of Writers.

The numerous honors awarded to Huch included appointment as honorary senator of the University of Munich (1924), the Goethe Prize of Frankfurt (1931), and an honorary doctorate at the University of Jena (1946). She died while visiting in Frankfurt am Main on Nov. 17, 1947.

Further Reading

Material on Ricarda Huch in English is scarce. For her place in German Literature see J. G. Robertson, A History of German Literature (rev. ed. 1947); H. Boeschenstein, The German Novel, 1934-44 (1949); and Ronald Gray, The German Tradition in Literature, 1871-1945 (1965).

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Huch, Ricarda (Brunswick, 1864-1947, Schönberg, Taunus), came of an educated family, studied at Zurich University (German universities did not then admit women), and obtained a doctorate in 1891. After a period at the Zurich Zentralbibliothek (1891-7), she became a teacher in Zurich and later in Bremen. By this time she had published two volumes of poetry (Gedichte, 1891 and 1894), two plays (Evoë!, 1892, and Dornröschen, 1893), her first novel, Erinnerungen von Ludolf Ursleu dem Jüngeren (1893), the story Der Mondreigen von Schlaraffis (1896), and a collection of tales, Erzählungen (3 vols., 1897). In 1898 she married an Italian dentist in Vienna and they took up residence in Trieste (then Austrian). During the marriage, which was dissolved in 1906, she produced a further volume of stories, and made a study of the Romantic movement (see Romantik), which resulted in the volumes Blüthezeit der Romantik (1899) and Ausbreitung und Verfall der Romantik (1902), published in 1908 as Die Romantik. Though not intended to be handbooks of literary history, these works show great empathy and skill in imaginative reconstruction. While in Switzerland she had come to admire Keller, on whom she published a study, Gottfried Keller (1904), and Gotthelf, to whom she paid tribute in a lecture, Jeremias Gotthelfs Weltanschauung (1917). This widening of her perspectives shows in the contrasting style of her next two novels. Vita somnium breve (1902, retitled Michael Unger, 1913) is still closely related to her first novel and to the mode of Jugendstil, compared to the powerful realism of Aus der Triumphgasse (1902, described as ‘Lebensskizzen’), the result of her immediate experience of the poverty and squalor of Trieste. In 1905 she published a collection of stories, Seifenblasen, one of which, Lebenslauf des heiligen Wonnebald Pück, appeared as a separate publication in 1913. Her perceptive and versatile fiction includes a detective novel on a topical subject, Der Fall Deruga (1917, also successful as a film); it centres on Dr Deruga, an Italian in Munich who is accused but finally acquitted of mercy killing.

During the Trieste period and then in Munich she became deeply involved in the exploration of history and in personalities who dedicated themselves to its progression, to which the Italian struggle for independence as well as the emergence of Germany on a national but democratic and liberal basis are central. Her Garibaldi studies resulted in Die Geschichten von Garibaldi (2 vols., 1906-7). In 1908 appeared Das Risorgimento (1918 as Menschen und Schicksale aus dem Risorgimento), out of which grew her outstanding biographical novel Das Leben des Grafen Federigo Confalonieri (1910). Ricarda Huch had by now moved to Brunswick and married a lawyer cousin. The marriage was dissolved in 1910. For the next ten to fifteen years her extensive studies, combined with a disciplined imagination, enabled her to present a plausible vision of past ages. Der große Krieg in Deutschland (3 vols., 1912-14) was retitled after the 1914-18 War (see Weltkriege I) as Der Dreißigjährige Krieg (1937, and see Dreissigjähriger Krieg). Deutsche Geschichte (3 vols., 1939-49) consists of (1) Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation (see Deutsches Reich, Altes); (2) Das Zeitalter der Glaubensspaltung; (3) Untergang des Römischen Reiches Deutscher Nation. These major works were supported by other publications, notably Wallenstein (1915), Michael Bakunin und die Anarchie (1923), Freiherr vom Stein (1925; 1932 under its subtitle Der Erwecker des Reichsgedankens), studies of German cities in the past, Im Alten Reich (2 vols., 1927-9; in 3 vols. as Lebensbilder deutscher Städte, 1938), and Alte und neue Götter (1930; 1948 under its subtitle 1848. Die Revolution des 19. Jahrhunderts in Deutschland, see Revolutionen 1848-9). These epic studies show her concern for the liberation of the people from the absolute rule of territorial princes and the renewal of principles of medieval government in a unified realm of federal states with popular representation. The man who came closest to her vision at a crucial time of reconstruction was Freiherr vom Stein. In the context of the social manifestations of Marxism it was again her belief in the individual freedom of enterprise within the collective that aroused her interest in Bakunin.

The third phase of Ricarda Huch's development, which grew out of both her own meditation and her historical interests, is her affirmation of Christianity, to which in her early life she had been indifferent or hostile. Vom Wesen des Menschen. Natur und Geist (1922, the modified title of a script written in 1914), Luthers Glaube (1916), Der Sinn der Heiligen Schrift (1919), Entpersönlichung (1921) and, returning once more to Goethe, Urphänomene (1946) are works reflecting her religious attitudes and Weltanschauung. In her last years she added with Herbstfeuer (1944) another volume to her poetry (Gesammelte Gedichte, 1929), and published two more stories, the satirical Der falsche Großvater (1947) and Weiße Nächte (1943), which, like Der letzte Sommer (1910), is set in conspiratorial Tsarist Russia. She presented a resolute front to the menace of National Socialism, and her letters to the president of the ‘reformed’ Akademie der Künste (see Akademien), written in March/April 1933, are models of calm, determined courage. She and her family had trouble with the authorities, but they escaped imprisonment. After the war she planned a work on the Resistance Movement (‘Weiße Rose’); she died before its completion, but the material she had prepared was published by G. Weisenborn as Der lautlose Aufstand (1953). At the height of her achievement Th. Mann described her as ‘Deutschlands erste Frau’.

During the last twenty years of her life Ricarda Huch lived for a number of years in Berlin, Heidelberg, Freiburg, and from 1936 in Jena; in 1947 she moved to the West. Her autobiographical Frühling in der Schweiz (1938), covering her early life, was followed by Mein Tagebuch (1946) and Erinnerungen an das eigene Leben (1980, with a preface by B. Balzer). Briefe an die Freunde, ed. M. Baum, appeared in 1955 (rev. edn. by J. Jessen, 1986), Briefwechsel mit Henriette Feuerbach und Ricarda Huch (correspondence of the author Joseph Viktor Widmann, 1842-1911), ed. Chr. von Dach, in 1965, and Mosaikbild einer Freundschaft. Ricarda Huchs Briefwechsel mit Elisabeth und Heinrich Wölfflin, an annotated edition by H. M. Müller, in 1994 (see Wölfflin, H.; Elisabeth is Heinrich's sister). Collections include Gesammelte Erzählungen (1962), Gesammelte Schriften, Essays, Reden, autobiographische Aufzeichnungen (1964), and Gesammelte Werke (11 vols.), ed. W. Emrich (1966-74).

Huch, Ricarda (rēkär'dä hʊkh), 1864-1947, German novelist, historian, and poet. She is best known for her historical romances of Garibaldi, Defeat and Victory (1906-7, tr. 1928, 1929), and of the Thirty Years War, Der grosse Krieg in Deutschland (1912-14). Other works include the novels Recollections of Ludolf Ursleu (1893, tr. 1913-15) and The Deruga Trial (1918, tr. 1929), two historical studies on romanticism (1899, 1902), and poems (1891, 1904, 1929, 1944).

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