Baron Eligius Franz Joseph von Münch-Bellinghausen
Encyclopedia
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
: Eligius Franz Joseph Freiherr von Münch-Bellinghausen) (April 2, 1806 – May 22, 1871) was an Austrian dramatist, poet and short-story writer of the Austrian Biedermeier period and is more generally known under his pseudonym, 'Friedrich Halm'.
He was the son of a district judge at Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
in Poland, at this time part of the Austrian Empire
Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...
. Early in his literary career he adopted the nom de plume of Friedrich Halm ("Halm" means a blade of grass or a blade of straw), and became one of the most popular dramatists in Vienna around the middle of the 19th century. His novellas are now regarded as more significant from a literary point of view than his dramatic writings.
Life and career
Münch-Bellinghausen was educated at the seminary of Melk AbbeyMelk Abbey
Melk Abbey or Stift Melk is an Austrian Benedictine abbey, and one of the world's most famous monastic sites. It is located above the town of Melk on a rocky outcrop overlooking the river Danube in Lower Austria, adjoining the Wachau valley....
and later at Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, where he studied philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
and jurisprudence
Jurisprudence
Jurisprudence is the theory and philosophy of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists , hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions...
, and where he began his career in 1826.
As a boy he took a keen interest in the theater and from 1833 enjoyed the friendship of his former teacher, the Benedictine
Benedictine
Benedictine refers to the spirituality and consecrated life in accordance with the Rule of St Benedict, written by Benedict of Nursia in the sixth century for the cenobitic communities he founded in central Italy. The most notable of these is Monte Cassino, the first monastery founded by Benedict...
Michael Leopold Enk von der Burg, who encouraged the poet to offer his drama Griseldis to the Hofburg theatre
Burgtheater
The Burgtheater , originally known as K.K. Theater an der Burg, then until 1918 as the K.K. Hofburgtheater, is the Austrian National Theatre in Vienna and one of the most important German language theatres in the world.The Burgtheater was created in 1741 and has become known as "die Burg" by the...
. Its successful production in 1835 established Halm's reputation as a playwright and henceforth he continued to write for the stage with varying success.
Münch-Bellinghausen becam Regierungsrat (government councillor) in 1840 and Kustos (chief keeper) of the Court Library in 1844, a position that Grillparzer had sought in vain. He was elected member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
Austrian Academy of Sciences
The Austrian Academy of Sciences is a legal entity under the special protection of the Federal Republic of Austria. According to the statutes of the Academy its mission is to promote the sciences and humanities in every respect and in every field, particularly in fundamental research...
in 1852 and life member of the Austrian House of Lords
Herrenhaus
The German term Herrenhaus is equivalent to the English House of Lords and describes roughly similar institutions as the English House of Lords in German-speaking countries.More specifically, Herrenhaus, can refer to either of the following:...
in 1861. In 1867 he was appointed superintendent of the two court-theatres, but three years later resigned this position which disputes had made distasteful to him. His health also had been failing.
Literary Work
Friedrich Halm's earliest full-length drama, Schwert, Hammer, Buch, completed in 1833 but never published, explores three various routes in quest of happiness: that of the warrior, that of the artisan, and that of the artist. This massive drama of several hundred pages, although still a piece of 'juvenilia', has numerous effective passages and anticipates the literary talent that was to burst upon the Viennese literary scene just three or four years later with the publication of Halm's tragedy, Griseldis. Of his many dramatic works the best known are, indeed, Griseldis (1837); Der Adept (1836; publ. 1838), Camoens (1838), Der Sohn der Wildnis (1842), and Der Fechter von Ravenna (1857). Griseldis is based on the well-known story of the faithful wife whose loyalty and devotion are put to the severest tests but who triumphs in the end. Der Sohn der Wildnis ("The Son of the Wilderness") is a romantic drama depicting the power of womanly love and virtue over rude barbarian strength. It was presented on the EnglishEngland
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
stage under the title of Ingomar the Barbarian. Der Fechter von Ravenna ("The Gladiator of Ravenna"), regarded as one of Halm's best dramas, is a tragedy
Tragedy
Tragedy is a form of art based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of...
having for its hero Thumelicus the son of Arminius, the liberator of Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
from Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
rule. All of these are distinguished by elegance of language, melodious versification and clever construction, and were for a time exceedingly popular.
Theatrically these plays are very effective, but the characters are improbable and the situations are often strained. Their popularity, which they owe largely to their smooth, polished and beautiful diction and skillfully interspersed lyrics, has not been lasting. Of Halm's numerous other dramas we may mention the vivid and powerful Sampiero (1856, depicting the tragic loss of humanity attendant upon political fanaticism); Iphigenie in Delphi (1856); Begum Somru (1863); Wildfeuer (1864); a German version of Shakespeare's Cymbeline
Cymbeline
Cymbeline , also known as Cymbeline, King of Britain or The Tragedy of Cymbeline, is a play by William Shakespeare, based on legends concerning the early Celtic British King Cunobelinus. Although listed as a tragedy in the First Folio, modern critics often classify Cymbeline as a romance...
that appeared on the stage in 1842, and an extremely effective and humorous comedy entitled Verbot und Befehl ("Prohibition and Decree", 1856).
He is also the author of lyrics, short stories, and of a narrative poem Charfreitag ("Good Friday") (1864). His poems, Gedichte, were published in Stuttgart
Stuttgart
Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....
, 1850 (new ed. Vienna. 1877). His pessimistic weltanschauung seems to have been formed very early on in life and never to have deserted him, as evidenced by early poems such as 'Eine Makame' and later poems, 'Schwere Jahre', where life is seen as essentially a vale of tears and filled with suffering, and only made bearable by the hope of a blissful and tranquil life of the spirit which will supervene after physical death.
Halm's high reputation during his lifetime is indicated by the stone bust which was carved of him and which still sits on top of the famous Burgtheater in Vienna, alongside those of Schiller, Goethe and Grillparzer.
From an early age, Halm showed an aptitude for fictional narrative, perhaps first exemplified in the charming tale, Die Abendgenossen, written when Halm was in his early twenties. Halm's other short stories, or novellas, which tend to focus on spiritual issues and self-destructive monomaniacal characters, are far superior to most of his dramas and are striking and impressive in content, full of psychological insights - especially his earliest major story, Das Auge Gottes ("The Eye of God"), a lengthy novella written in 1826, about the supernatural reverberations of the blasphemous act of the desecration of a holy icon, and his final narrative masterpiece, Das Haus an der Veronabrücke ("The House on Verona Bridge"), centring on the inner collapse of a man given over to a morally repellent but overriding "idée fixe" (the enforced sexual coupling of his wife with another man). His novella, Die Marzipan-Lise ("Marzipan Lise"), is credited with being one of the first "criminal fiction tales" of German literature and is now available as an audio book on CD. Furthermore, the composer, Brahms, used some of Halm's verse as the basis for a number of his Lieder.
Overall it can be said that it is as a short-story or 'novella' writer that Halm has secured a place in the history of German/Austrian literature. His novellas mark Halm out as a writer of talent, psychological penetration and substance. His novella, The House at Verona Bridge (Das Haus an der Veronabruecke) alone stands as a milestone in 19th-century Austrian literature for its probing and insightful treatment of an obsessive mentality that inevitably leads its possessor into tragedy and death.
His collected works, Samtliche Werke, were published arranged in chronological order in eight volumes (1856–1864), to which four posthumous volumes were added in 1872. Also published were Ausgewählte Werke, ed. by A. Schlossar in 4 vols. (1904), and a collection of previously unpublished early poems and the full text of Halm's Das Auge Gottes (2011), edited by Dr. Tony Page.