Ödön von Horváth explained

Ödön von Horváth
Birth Name:Edmund Josef von Horváth
Birth Date:9 December 1901
Birth Place:Sušak, Rijeka, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Croatia)
Death Place:Paris, French Third Republic (now France)
Occupation:playwright and novelist
Signature:Horvath Signature.jpg

Edmund Josef von Horváth (9 December 1901, in Sušak, Rijeka, Austro-Hungarian Empire – 1 June 1938, in Paris, French Third Republic) was an Austro-Hungarian playwright and novelist who wrote in German, and went by the nom de plume Ödön von Horváth. He was one of the most critically admired writers of his generation prior to his untimely death. He enjoyed a series of successes on the stage with socially poignant and romantic plays, including Revolte auf Côte 3018 (1927), Sladek (1929), Italienische Nacht (1930), Hin und Her (1934), and Der Jüngste Tag (1937). His novels include Der ewige Spießer (1930), Ein Kind unserer Zeit (1938), and Jugend ohne Gott (1938).

Early life and education

Ödön von Horváth was the eldest son of an Austro-Hungarian diplomat of Hungarian origins from Slavonia, Edmund (Ödön) Josef Horváth, and Maria Lulu Hermine (Prehnal) Horváth, who was from an Austro-Hungarian military family.

From 1908, Ödön attended elementary school in Budapest, and later attended the Rákóczianum, where his education was in the Hungarian language. In 1909, his father was ennobled and assigned to Munich, unaccompanied. In 1913, Horváth attended secondary school in Pressburg and Vienna, where he learned German as a second language, and earned the Matura (secondary school diploma) then reunited with his parents at Murnau am Staffelsee, in Upper Bavaria; from 1919, Horváth studied at the Ludwig Maximilians University, in Munich.

Later life and death

He started writing as a student, from 1920. After quitting university without a degree in early 1922, he moved to Berlin. Later, he lived in Salzburg and Murnau am Staffelsee. In 1931, he was awarded, along with Erik Reger, the Kleist Prize. In 1933, at the beginning of the Nazi regime in Germany, he relocated to Vienna. Following the annexation of the Federal State of Austria with Nazi Germany in 1938, Horváth emigrated to Paris.

Ödön von Horváth was hit by a falling branch from a tree and killed during a thunderstorm on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, opposite the Théâtre Marigny, in June 1938. Ironically, only a few days earlier, von Horváth had said to a friend: "I am not so afraid of the Nazis...There are worse things one can be afraid of, namely things one is afraid of without knowing why. For instance, I am afraid of streets. Roads can be hostile to one, can destroy one. Streets scare me." And a few years earlier, von Horváth had written poetry about lightning: "Yes, thunder, that it can do. And bolt and storm. Terror and destruction."[1] [2]

Ödön von Horváth was buried in the Saint-Ouen Cemetery, in northern Paris. In 1988, on the 50th anniversary of his death, his remains were transferred to Vienna and reinterred at the Heiligenstädter Friedhof.

Literary themes

Important topics in Horváth's works were popular culture, politics, and history. He especially tried to warn of the rise of Fascism in Europe and its dangers. Among Horváth's more enduringly popular works, (Youth Without God) describes the youth in Nazi Germany from the point of view of a disgruntled teacher who initially is an opportunist but is helpless against the racist and militaristic Nazi propaganda that dehumanizes his pupils.

The English title of his novel Ein Kind unserer Zeit (A Child of Our Time) was used by Michael Tippett for his oratorio (1939–1941), composed during World War II.

Works

Plays

Novels

Other prose

Quotes

In popular culture

Bibliography

Balme, Christopher B., The Reformation of Comedy Genre Critique in the Comedies of Odon von Horvath University of Otago, Dunedin 1985

Notes and References

  1. Hildebrand D. Horvath. Rororo publishers. 1975. .
  2. Krischke K. Ödön von Horvath. Heyne publishers. 1985. .
  3. Web site: Don Juan Comes Back From The War – Finborough Theatre . 11 September 2021.