Hugo von Hofmannsthal

The Austrian poet, dramatist, and essayist Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1874-1929) is best known for his opera librettos. He is also considered a master of German lyric poetry.

Hugo von Hofmannsthal was born in Vienna and spent most of his life there. He charmed the literary world at the age of 17. Hofmannsthal belonged to the circle of Jung-Wien poets, who were little affected by the naturalistic tendencies of their time. He was strongly influenced by the neoromantic movement and European symbolism.

Hofmannsthal's first period (1890-1899) began when the sensitive youth mingled with artists and men of letters in Vienna's famous Café Griensteidl. His first poems, critical essays, and lyrical playlets (two of which were professionally performed on the Berlin stage) appeared under the pseudonym Loris Melikow. The first of a dozen verse plays written in this period, Gestern (1891; Yesterday), shows him still a beginner, but with Der Tod des Tizian (1892; Death of Titian) and especially Der Tor und der Tod (1893; Death and the Fool), he reaches maturity as a master of German verse.

Hofmannsthal's middle phase (1900-1918) saw his greatest public success. In 1902, convinced that words had no meaning and that communication was impossible, he manifested this obsession in his famous literary credo Brief des Lord Chandos. His lyrical production ceased abruptly, and he turned instead to writing plays, opera, and even ballet. His most famous work from this period is Jedermann (1911; Everyman), based on a 15th-century English morality play and now produced every year at the Salzburg Festival. Other works from this phase are Elektra (1903), Der Rosenkavalier (1911), and Ariadne auf Naxos (1912), which were set to music by Richard Strauss. Thus began the close cooperation between Hofmannsthal and Strauss which was to last for 2 decades.

Hofmannsthal's last period (1919-1929) includes the delightful comedy Der Schwierige (1921; The Difficult Gentleman). But the collapse of the Hapsburg Empire in 1918 was for him a personal tragedy from which he never fully recovered. In a series of essays he spoke as an ardent interpreter and advocate of Austria and its cultural heritage.

To the Salzburg Festivals, which he confounded with Max Reinhardt, he dedicated Das Salzburger Grosse Welttheater (1922). Other works of this period are Die Frau ohne Schatten (1919; The Woman without a Shadow), which Strauss set to music, and, his last and most ambitious work, the tragedy Der Turm (1923; The Tower).

Hugo von Hofmannsthal lived with his wife and children in Rodaun, outside Vienna. He died there on July 15, 1929.

Further Reading

Austrian novelist Herman Broch wrote the best introduction to the work of Hofmannsthal available in English translation in Hofmannsthal's Selected Prose (1952). The Institute of Germanic Languages of the University of London, which had arranged a Hofmannsthal exhibition, published a collection of essays as volume 5 of its series, Frederick Norman, ed., Hofmannsthal: Studies in Commemoration (1963), which contains a useful bibliography on Hofmannsthal. Ronald Gray, The German Tradition in Literature, 1871-1945 (1965), has a section on Hofmannsthal. □

Hofmannsthal, Hugo von (1874–1929), Austrian poet and dramatist, who as a young man was in the forefront of the reaction against naturalism. His early verse-plays, of which Der Tor und der Tod (Death and the Fool) was produced at Munich in 1898, reveal his delight in beauty and in poetic and mystical intuitions, but in his later plays his exquisite poetry was diluted in an effort to enhance the dramatic content of his dialogue and relate his characters to a social framework. He turned to subjects which were obviously theatrical, and his first success in the theatre came with Elektra (1903), produced in Berlin by Reinhardt, who directed most of his plays. It was followed by Ödipus und die Sphinx (1905), König Ödipus (1907), and Alkestis (1909). Also to this period belongs the first of his adaptations, which in his hands became almost new plays—Das gerettete Venedig (1905), based on Otway's Venice Preserv'd, produced with sets by Gordon Craig. In 1911 Hofmannsthal produced what is perhaps his best known play, Jedermann, based on the old Dutch morality play Elckerlyc (Everyman) and incorporating some elements from Hans Sachs. After its first production in Berlin it was transferred to the Salzburg Festival, founded in 1917 by Reinhardt and Hofmannsthal, and it has since been seen at all the festivals there, in an open-air setting in front of the Cathedral. For the festival in 1922 Hofmannsthal adapted Calderón's Elgran teatro del mundo as Das Salzburger grosse Welttheater. In two plays of the same period, set in and near Vienna, Der Schwierige (The Difficult Man, 1921) and Der Unbestechliche (The Incorruptible Man, 1923), Hofmannsthal reverted to the vein of comedy which had been apparent in Der Abenteurer und die Sängerin (The Adventurer and the Singer, 1898) and Cristinas Heimreise (Cristina's Journey Home, 1909). Both are pleas for marital fidelity as the natural and desirable sequel to the equally natural philanderings of immaturity, but Der Schwierige in particular stands out as a masterpiece, combining high comedy of subtle human relationships with irony and social satire. Hofmannsthal's last play was again based on Calderón, an adaptation, as Der Turm (1925), of La vida es sueño, which takes up once more the conflict between material power and spiritual integrity.

Hofmannsthal's plays are little known in the English-speaking world, where he is remembered mainly as the librettist of several of Richard Strauss's operas, including Elektra (1909), based on his play.

Hofmannsthal, Hugo von (b Vienna, 1874; d Rodaun, nr. Vienna, 1929). Austrian author, poet, and playwright. With Max Reinhardt and others, founded Salzburg Fest. in 1920. Librettist for several works of Richard Strauss: the operas Elektra (1906–8), Der Rosenkavalier (1909–10), Ariadne auf Naxos (1912, 2nd version 1916), Die Frau ohne Schatten (1914–18), Die ägyptische Helena (1924–7), and Arabella (1928–32), the ballet Josephslegende (1913–14); Der Burger als Edelmann (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme) (1912 and 1917); ed. with Strauss of Beethoven's ballet Die Geschöpfe des Prometheus; cantata Tüchtigen stellt das schnelle Glück (1914). Also librettist for Wellesz's Alkestis (1922–3). Plays incl. Alkestis (1893), Elektra (1903), and Jedermann (1912).

Hugo von Hofmannsthal , 1874–1929, Austrian dramatist and poet. His first verses were published when he was 16 years old, and his play The Death of Titian (1892, tr. 1913) when he was 18. His varied gifts as poet and as dramatist are shown in his librettos for Richard Strauss, including Elektra (1903), Der Rosenkavalier (1911), Ariadne auf Naxos (1912), and Arabella (1933). After World War I, he was one of the founders of the Salzburg Festival, where his plays, such as the tragedy Der Turm (1925), his adaptation of Everyman (1911, tr. 1917), are regularly produced.

Bibliography: See his Selected Writings (3 vol., 1952–63); his correspondence with Strauss (1955, tr. 1961); studies by H. Broch (1984), M. Hamburger (1970), and B. Bennett (1988).