Gessner, Salomon (Zurich, 1730-88, Zurich), a bookseller's son, was apprenticed to the bookseller Spener in Berlin. Giving up this employment, he lived for a time by painting and engraving, for which he had a considerable talent. In 1750 he settled in Zurich, continuing to live by painting, including painting on porcelain. He began to write idylls in poetic prose, beginning with Daphnis (1754). His Idyllen (1756) achieved a nation-wide success. In Der Tod Abels (1758) he attempted an epic in prose, which was followed by two plays (Schäferspiele), two stories, including Der erste Schiffer, and a few more idylls, Neue Idyllen (1772).
In his idylls, Geßner, who is indebted to Theocritus and Virgil, creates an idealized, orderly, almost horticultural state of nature, from which everything rough and craggy has been eliminated; his shepherds are similarly untouched by the ruder aspects of country life. His work embodies the city-dweller's longing for a nature which he does not know, and this explains its instant popularity. W. Raabe uses Geßner's Idyllen, the publication of which coincided with the outbreak of the Seven Years War (see Siebenjähriger Krieg), as a powerful contrast to rural realities in time of war in his novel Hastenbeck. Geßner remained unspoilt by his success, acknowledging the limitations of his literary and artistic talents.
The Oxford Companion to German Literature. Copyright © 1976, 1986, 1997, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
