Schlegel, August Wilhelm Von

Schlegel, August Wilhelm von (ou`gst vĭl`hĕlm fən shlā`gəl), 1767–1845, German scholar and poet. With his brother, Friedrich von Schlegel, he founded the Athenaeum, which he edited (1798–1800). He served as secretary to Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte (later Charles XIV of Sweden) and became professor (1818–45) of art and literary history at Bonn. Schlegel was one of the first critics to see the importance of social evolution in the history of art, and he was a champion of the Nibelungenlied. He is most noted for his extraordinary translations of Shakespeare (1797–1810), later completed by Ludwig Tieck and others, which established Shakespeare's greatness in Germany.

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Schlegel, August Wilhelm von

(born Sept. 8, 1767, Hannover, Hanover—died May 12, 1845, Bonn) German scholar and critic. He worked as a tutor and wrote for Friedrich Schiller's short-lived periodical Die Horen before cofounding with his brother Friedrich von Schlegel the periodical Athenäum (1798–1800), which became the organ of German Romanticism. While a professor at the University of Jena, he undertook translations of the works of William Shakespeare (1797–1810) that became standard editions and are among the finest of all German literary translations. His Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature (1809–11) was widely translated and helped spread fundamental Romantic ideas throughout Europe. From 1818 until his death he taught at the University of Bonn.

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Schlegel, August Wilhelm Von 

Born Sept. 8,1767, in Hanover; died May 12,1845, in Bonn. German literary historian and writer. Brother of F. von Schlegel.

A. von Schlegel studied classical philology at the University of Göttingen from 1787 to 1791. Beginning in 1818, he taught literary history at the University of Bonn and did work in Sanskrit studies. He was one of the founders of comparative linguistics. Schlegel belonged to the Jena school of German romantics. In his works, including the Berlin lectures on literature and aesthetics (1801–04, published 1884) and the Vienna lectures on dramatic art and literature (1808, published 1809–11), he gave the first systematic analysis of romanticism as a historical and aesthetic concept. In this analysis, which became famous throughout Europe, he contrasted ancient, classical aesthetics to modern, romantic aesthetics.

An outstanding theorist of artistic translation, Schlegel translated works by Dante, Calderón, and Petrarch; his translations of the plays of Shakespeare remain unsurpassed. Schlegel’s own literary works, including Poetic Works (1811) and his dramas, were influenced by classicism.

WORKS

Kritische Schriften und Briefe, vols. 1–6. Stuttgart, 1962–67.
In Russian translation:
“Lektsii o literature i iskusstve: Fragmenty.” In Istoriia estetiki, vol. 3. Moscow, 1967.

REFERENCES

Berkovskii, N. Ia. “Esteticheskie pozitsii nemetskogo romantizma.” In Literaturnaia teoriia nemetskogo romantizma. Leningrad, 1934.
Besenbeck, A. Kunstanschauung und Kunstlehre A. W. Schlegels. Berlin, 1930.

N. IU. PALIEVSKAIA