Johann Peter Hebel

Hebel, Johann Peter (Basel, 1760-1826, Schwetzingen), born in humble circumstances, lost his father in infancy, and his mother when he was 13. Their savings and the generous help of friends enabled him to escape the worst consequences of being orphaned. Schooling, first at Hausen, then at Karlsruhe, prepared him for theological study at Erlangen (1778-80), and he took holy orders in the Protestant Church in Baden. Hebel became a private tutor in Hertingen for a short time, and was then appointed a teacher (Präzeptoratsvikarius) at Lörrach just inside the Baden frontier with Basel (1783-91). In 1791 he was appointed a teacher at the Gymnasium in Karlsruhe, rising to the rank of professor in 1798. Ten years later he became head of the school, and thereby also ex officio a member of the ecclesiastical authority for Baden. In 1819 he was appointed Prälat, the highest office in the Evangelical Church of the land. He died in Schwetzingen while making an official visit to north Baden.

Hebel had begun to write poetry in about 1800, and his first collection of 32 poems in south Swabian dialect appeared in 1803 as Alemannische Gedichte. They achieved a modest success, being reprinted three times up to 1820. In 1803 he began to contribute to the official Calendar for the Lutheran Church in Baden, and in 1807 he became its editor and principal author. In 1808 its title was changed to Der Rheinländische Hausfreund. In this form Hebel edited it from 1808 to 1815, and again in 1819. His contributions to it in the form of pithy anecdotes in prose were collected and published by Cotta in Stuttgart in 1811 as Schatzkästlein des Rheinischen Hausfreundes.

Hebel possessed a gift for simple, direct writing and a sincere and unaffected mind. His popular poetry and prose, whether in dialect or in educated German, owe nothing to movements, but speak to the common man in his own tongue. His work has continued to inspire writers, notably B. Brecht and P. Bichsel, and is the subject of a study by M. Heidegger.

Sämmtliche Werke (8 vols.) appeared 1832-4, Werke (2 vols.), ed. O. Behaghel, 1883-4, and, ed. E. Meckel, 1968, Poetische Werke, based on edn. of 1834 with postscript by Th. Salfinger, 1961, and Briefe, ed. W. Zentner, 2nd rev. edn. 1957; Der Rheinländische Hausfreund (2 vols., facsimile prints of edns. 1808-15 and 1819), ed. L. Rohner, 1981.

Johann Peter Hebel
Born	10 May 1760(1760-05-10) Basel
Died	22 September 1826 (aged 66) Schwetzingen near Heidelberg

Johann Peter Hebel (10 May 1760 – 22 September 1826) was a German short story writer and dialectal poet, most famous for his collection of alemannic tales Schatzkästlein des rheinischen Hausfreundes (Treasure chest of the family friend by the Rhine).

Life

Hebel's father, a weaver and batman who loved learning, died when Hebel was little over a year old. As a result, Hebel was brought up amidst poverty-stricken conditions in the village of Hausen im Wiesental, where he received his earliest education. A promising student, he found friends who enabled him to complete his school education and to study theology (1778-1780) at Erlangen.

At the end of his university course he was for a time a private tutor, then became teacher at the gymnasium in Karlsruhe, and in 1808 was appointed director of the school. He was subsequently appointed member of the Consistory and evangelical prelate.

S' Hebelhuus

Memorials have been erected to him at Karlsruhe, Lörrach, Hausen im Wiesental, Basel and Schwetzingen.

Works

The original illustration for Unverhofftes Wiedersehen (Unexpected Reunion), a famous story collected in Schatzkästlein.

Hebel is one of the most widely read of all German popular poets and writers. His poetical narratives and lyric poems, written in the Alemanic dialect, are popular in the best sense.

His Alemannische Gedichte (1803) bucolicize, in the words of Goethe, the whole world in the most attractive manner (verbauert das ganze Universum auf die anmutigste Weise). Indeed, few modern German poets surpass him in fidelity, naiveté, humour, and in the freshness and vigour of his descriptions.

The anecdotes and tales contained in the Schatzkästlein des rheinischen Hausfreundes belong to the best class of German stories, and according to August Friedrich Christian Vilmar (1800-1868) in his Geschichte der deutschen Literatur are worth more than a cartload of novels (wiegen ein ganzes Fuder Romane auf). Admirers of his work include Goethe, Franz Kafka, Walter Benjamin, Ludwig Wittgenstein and Martin Heidegger.

External links

German Wikisource has original text related to this article: Alemannische Gedichte

German Wikisource has original text related to this article: Schatzkästlein des rheinischen Hausfreundes

• Comprehensive scope of information, curriculum vitae, pictures, articles, the complete 290 "Kalendergeschichten" (Tales from the calendar) as well as the complete "Alemannische Gedichte" (alemanic poems)
• Homepage of the Primary/Secondary-School of his formerly homeborough Hausen im Wiesental
• Works by Johann Peter Hebel at Project Gutenberg

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.

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