Karl Julius Schröer

Photo of Karl Julius Schröer.
Karl Julius Schröer

Karl Julius Schröer (January 11, 1825 in Bratislava (German: Pressburg/Preßburg), then part of the Austrian Empire – December 16, 1900 in Vienna) was an Austrian linguist and literary critic.

Life

Schröer studied literature and linguistics from 1843-1846 in Leipzig, Halle and Berlin. In 1849 he became a professor of German literature and language in Pest. He returned to Bratislava in 1850 and became a schoolteacher.

Political developments in 1860 forced Schröer to leave Hungary for Vienna. From 1861-1866 he was the director of the Evangelical Lutheran School in Vienna's Karlsplatz district. In 1866, he became a professor of Literary History at the Vienna University of Technology.

In the following years, Schröer researched the folklore of the ethnic Germans, or Danube Swabians, of Hungary. As part of his research, Schröer discovered a Medieval cycle of Danube Swabian mystery plays in Oberufer, a village since engulfed by the Bratislava's brorough of Ružinov. Schröer collected manuscripts, made meticulous textual comparisons, and published his findings in the book Deutsche Weihnachtspiele aus Ungarn ("The German Nativity Plays of Hungary") in 1857/1858. Several scholars later extended this work.

In Vienna, Schröer became a major figure in Goethe scholarship). He was a founding member of the Goethe Society of Vienna in 1878 and edited the society's official publication until 1886. Schröer was especially concerned with Faust scholarship, providing editor's commentary in a two-volume edition of that play. He also edited a six-volume edition of Goethe's dramas. Schröer campaigned for the erection of a Goethe monument in Vienna, which was approved in 1894 with a design by Edmund Hellmann. Schröer died one day before the monument was unveiled.

Legacy

Schröer's student Rudolf Steiner later founded the Waldorf system of education and included the Oberufer plays in a curriculum that still includes them today. In the last lecture of his Karmic Relationships Volume IV, Steiner alleged that Karl Schröer was a reincarnation of Plato.

An English translation of the Oberufer Plays, made by Cecil Harwood of The Inklings, was published in 1944 with the title, Christmas Plays from Oberufer. The Paradise Play, The Shepherd's Play, The Three Kings' Play.

References

External links

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