Härtling, Peter (Chemnitz, 1933- ), the son of a lawyer, fled in 1945 from Olmütz to Zwettl (Lower Austria), but on his father's death moved in 1946 to Nürtingen where he resumed his grammar school education; in the same year his mother committed suicide. In 1952 he began a successful career in journalism and from 1967 to 1973 was chief editor and (from 1968) director of the publishing house S. Fischer in Frankfurt. Having already established himself as a writer, he now turned to full-time authorship. His approach to writing was determined by his childhood and wartime experience, which left him with a sense of homelessness and a deep scepticism towards history and recollection in relation to truth and identity. This ‘Widerstand zur Geschichte’ underlies all his fiction and his critical depiction of society. In Das Familienfest oder Das Ende einer Geschichte (1969) which opens in the mid-19th c., the historian Georg Lauterbach fails to establish the cause of a fire, a traumatic event of his childhood, because of inconsistent evidence from differently oriented observers, and in 1967 the physics teacher Brenner has the same experience when attempting to write a factually reliable family chronicle. Härtling's presentation of periods in history, past and present, aims at demonstrating the manipulating power of social and ideological forces and their effect on the individual. This and his own artistic sensibilities and musicality determine his choice of artists, especially those associated with Swabia (see also Schwäbische Dichterschule). With the exception of his biographical novel on Hölderlin (Hölderlin, 1976), on whom Härtling is an authority, he chose titles that underline the fictitious character of his profiles, the first of which, Niembsch oder Der Stillstand. Eine Suite (1964), on N. Lenau, established his name. Die dreifache Maria (1982) centres on Mörike, and Waiblingers Augen (1987) on the young W. F. Waiblinger and the episode with Julie, the daughter of his Jewish professor of literature, which ends in a scandal forcing him to leave Tübingen for Italy. His early death is presented as the inexorable consequence of his self-destructive quest for an ideal embracing the perfect fusion of life and art, embodied but not comprehended by Julie until after his death. A significant combination of themes is contained in Das Windrad (1983) which turns to contemporary conditions in West Germany and the emergence of ecological concerns. Their potential as a motivating force for social renewal is exemplified by Georg Landerer, who at the height of achievement abandons his middle-class life for an ‘alternative existence’ in which the artist Baldur Kannabich and an autistic boy become a source of inspiration and a challenge to his parental instincts. Kannabich's design of a wind turbine (the ‘Windrad’ of the title) is the climax of his attempt to demonstrate the relevance of art to life to which his entire work is devoted. When this is maliciously destroyed by children he takes his own life, but his spirit lives on in Landerer's purposeful life and his adoption of the young Pokko, whose dumbness symbolizes the silent suffering of abandoned children. Härtling's perceptive portrayal of Pokko is a reminder of his skill as a writer of children's literature. His other novels include Janek. Porträt einer Erinnerung (1966), based on the Viennese actor and comedian Max Pallenberg (1877-1934), Eine Frau (1974), Hubert oder Die Rückkehr nach Casablanca (1978), Felix Guttmann (1985), Schubert (1992, on F. Schubert), and the autobiographical works Zwettl. Nachprüfung einer Erinnerung (1973), Nachgetragene Liebe (1980), Herzwand. Mein Roman (1990), and the Novelle Božena (1994).

The first collections of Härtling's poetry appeared in the 1950s, followed by Spielgeist, Spielgeist (1962), Neue Gedichte (1972), Vorwarnung (1983), Sätze von Liebe (1983), Ich rufe die Wörter zusammen (1984), Die Mörsinger Pappel (1987), and Gedichte 1953-1987 (1989). The rhythmic flow of his verse intertwines inner and outer experience, dream and reality, effecting a pervasive sense of poignantly restrained alienation.

Other volumes include Meine Lektüre. Literatur als Widerstand (1980), Der spanische Soldat oder Finden und Erfinden. Frankfurter Poetik-Vorlesungen 1984 (1984), Brüder und Schwestern. Tagebuch eines Synodalen (1991), and Zwischen Untergang und Aufbruch. Aufsätze, Reden, Gespräche (1990), ed. G. Drommer. Härtling has been awarded a number of prizes for his work as a critic, editor, and writer.

The Oxford Companion to German Literature. Copyright © 1976, 1986, 1997, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.