- Simplicissimus is also a name for the 1668 novel Simplicius
Simplicissimus and its protagonist.
Simplicissimus was a satirical German
weekly magazine started by Albert Langen in April
1896 and published through 1967, with a hiatus from 1944-1954. It
became a biweekly in 1964.[1] It took its name from the
protagonist of Grimmelshausen's 1668 novel Der Abenteuerliche Simplicissimus Teutsch.
Combining brash and politically daring content, a bright, immediate, surprisingly modern graphic style, Simplicissimus
featured the work of German cartoonist Thomas Theodor Heine on every cover, and published the
work of writers such as Thomas Mann and Rainer Maria
Rilke. Its most reliable targets for caricature were stiff Prussian military figures,
and rigid German social and class distinctions as seen from the more relaxed, liberal atmosphere of Munich.
In 1898 Kaiser Wilhelm's objections to being ridiculed on the cover resulted in the
magazine being suppressed, publisher Langen taking five years' exile in Switzerland and a
fine of 30,000 mark, a six month prison sentence for the cartoonist Heine, and seven
months prison for the writer Frank Wedekind. Again in 1906 the editor Ludwig Thoma was imprisoned for six months for attacking the clergy. These controversies only served to
increase circulation, which peaked at about 85,000 copies. Upon Germany's entry into World War
I, the weekly dulled its satirical tone, began supporting the war effort, and considered closing down. Thereafter the
strongest political satire expressed in graphics became the province of artists George
Grosz and Käthe Kollwitz (who were both contributors) and John Heartfield.
The editor Ludwig Thoma joined the army in a medical unit in 1917, and lost his taste
for satire, denouncing his previous work at the magazine, calling it immature and deplorable. He left the magazine in the
1920s. During the Weimar era the magazine continued to
publish and took a strong stand against extremists on the left and on the right. As the National
Socialists gradually came to power, they issued their pattern of verbal accusations, attacks, threats, personal
intimidations, then arrests against the artists and writers of Simplicissimus. It continued publishing, in declining form,
until finally ceasing publication in 1944. It was revived from 1954-1967.
Other graphic artists associated with the magazine include Olaf Gulbransson,
Edward Thöny, Bruno Paul, and Karl
Arnold.
Notes
- ^ Harvard University Library Catalog, Hollis number 006013229.
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