Hugo Salus (3 August 1866 – 4 February 1929) was a German-Czech physician, writer and poet.

Life

Salus was born in

Česká Lípa Česká Lípa (; ) is a town in the Liberec Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 37,000 inhabitants, making it the most populated Czech town without city status. The historic town centre is well preserved and is protected as an urban monume ...

Bohemia Bohemia ( ; ; ) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. In a narrow, geographic sense, it roughly encompasses the territories of present-day Czechia that fall within the Elbe River's drainage basin, but historic ...

Austrian Empire The Austrian Empire, officially known as the Empire of Austria, was a Multinational state, multinational European Great Powers, great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the Habsburg monarchy, realms of the Habsburgs. Duri ...

on 3 August 1866. He studied medicine in

Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...

and established a practice in

gynaecology Gynaecology or gynecology (see American and British English spelling differences) is the area of medicine concerned with conditions affecting the female reproductive system. It is often paired with the field of obstetrics, which focuses on pre ...

there from 1895 onwards. Apart from his professional activities as a doctor, he published numerous volumes of poetry and short stories, and was one of the more important exponents of German-Jewish literature in the Prague of his day, moving in a circle which included younger figures of the stature of

Franz Kafka Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a novelist and writer from Prague who was Jewish, Austrian, and Czech and wrote in German. He is widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature. His work fuses elements of Litera ...

, Max Brod,

Franz Werfel Franz Viktor Werfel (; 10 September 1890 – 26 August 1945) was an Austrian-Bohemian novelist, playwright, and poet whose career spanned World War I, the Interwar period, and World War II. He is primarily known as the author of '' The Forty ...

Egon Erwin Kisch Egon Erwin Kisch (29 April 1885 – 31 March 1948) was an Austro-Hungarian and Czechoslovak writer and journalist, who wrote in German. He styled himself ''Der Rasende Reporter'' (The Racing Reporter) for his countless travels to the far corners ...

Oskar Baum Oskar Baum (21 January 1883 – 20 March 1941) was a Czech music educator and writer in the German language. Life Baum was born on 21 January 1883 in Plzeň, as the son of a Jewish cloth goods merchant. He had vision problems from the time o ...

Johannes Urzidil Johannes Urzidil (3 February 1896 in Prague – 2 November 1970 in Rome) was a German-Bohemian writer, poet and historian. His father was a German Bohemian and his mother was Jewish. Life Urzidil was educated in Prague, studying German, art hi ...

, Paul Kornfeld, Ernst Weiss and Kamil Hoffmann. Several of his works were illustrated by

Heinrich Vogeler Johann Heinrich Vogeler (December 12, 1872 – June 14, 1942) was a German people, German painter, designer, and architect, associated with the Düsseldorf school of painting. Early life He was born in Bremen, and studied at the Kunstakadem ...

, while

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian and American composer, music theorist, teacher and writer. He was among the first Modernism (music), modernists who transformed the practice of harmony in 20th-centu ...

set two of his poems to music. A prolific author, he soon became 'the acknowledged arbiter of Prague literary taste', and "the most respected Bohemian poet writing in German" at the time. An early friend and mentor of

Rainer Maria Rilke René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926), known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was an Austrian poet and novelist. Acclaimed as an Idiosyncrasy, idiosyncratic and expressive poet, he is widely recognized as ...

, his verse had some influence on Rilke's early lyric style. To some of his fellow Jewish intellectuals, he was regarded as an unadulterated "assimilationist," and "a militant protagonist of German liberalism and Jewish assimilation" whose attachment to Zionism was little more than a matter of embracing a fashionable trend (''Mode-Zionismus''). Lothar Kahn, on the other hand, says that while Salus was described by

Max Brod Max Brod (; 27 May 1884 – 20 December 1968) was a Bohemian-born Israeli author, composer, and journalist. He is notable for promoting the work of writer Franz Kafka and composer Leoš Janáček. Although he was a prolific writer in his ow ...

as an unqualified assimilationist, "this may be an exaggeration, Salus did hope, all else failing, for full Jewish absorption into the host society." Of both him and his rival Friedrich Adler, Kafka biographer Peter Mailloux says, "their Jewishness existed in name only." The philosopher

Emil Utitz Emil Utitz (27 May 1883 – 2 November 1956) was a Czech philosopher and psychologist of Jewish descent. He was educated in Prague, where he was a classmate of Franz Kafka. After studies in Munich, Leipzig, and Prague, he became a professor in Ro ...

put it a bit differently, "Both acknowledged Jews, they nevertheless felt themselves to be the authentic representatives of all Germans in Bohemia, as well as further afield. Those Germans wanted little to do with Prague in any case, and least of all with its Jews. But Salus and Adler were liberals of the old stamp."
''Prague Territories: National Conflict and Cultural Innovation in Franz Kafka'' Scott Spector Kahn notes that "Salus made use of Jewish folkways and observances in his poetry, plays, and occasional fiction." Salus died in Prague on 4 February 1929, aged 62.

Works (a selection)

Poems

* ''Gedichte.'' 1898 * ''Neue Gedichte.'' 1899 * ''Ehefrühling.'' 1900 * ''Reigen.'' 1900 * ''Christa. Ein Evangelium der Schönheit.'' 1902 * ''Ernte.'' 1903 * ''Neue Garben.'' 1904 * ''Die Blumenschale.'' 1908 * ''Glockenklang.'' 1911 * ''Das neue Buch.'' 1919 * ''Klarer Klang.'' 1922 * ''Helle Träume.'' 1924 * ''Die Harfe Gottes.'' 1928

Prose

* ''Novellen des Lyrikers.'' 1903 * ''Das blaue Fenster.'' 1906 * ''Trostbüchlein für Kinderlose.'' 1909 * ''Andersen-Kalender 1910'' (12 Fairy tales) * ''Schwache Helden.'' 1910 * ''Die Hochzeitsnacht. Die schwarzen Fahen.'' 1913 * ''Seelen und Sinne.'' 1913 * ''Nachdenkliche Geschichten.'' 1914 * ''Der Heimatstein und andere Erzählungen.'' 1915 * ''Sommerabend.'' 1916 * ''Die schöne Barbara.'' 1919 * ''Freund Kafkus.'' 1919 * ''Der Beschau. Eine Ghettogeschichte.'' 1920 * ''Der Jungfernpreis.'' 1921 * ''Vergangenheit.'' 1921

Theatre

* ''Susanna im Bade.'' 1901 * ''Römische Komödie.'' 1909

Secondary literature

* Wertheimer, Paul: ''Hugo Salus,'' Prague 1902. * Tinkl, Lotte: ''Neuromantische Elemente bei Hugo Salus und Franz Herold,'' Diss. Vienna, 1949. * Franzel, Emil, 'Hugo Salus. Ein Stück versunkenes Prag,' in ''Sudetendeutscher Kulturalmanach,'' 7 (1969). * Kletzander, Hermann, ''Hugo Salus und der Jugendstil,'' Diss. Salzburg 1977. * Abret, Helga, 'Hugo Salus und

Jaroslav Vrchlický Jaroslav Vrchlický (; 17 February 1853 – 9 September 1912) was a Czech people, Czech lyrical poet. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel prize in literature eight times. Life He was born Emilius Jakob Frida in Louny ...

. Das Verhältnis beider Dichter an Hand einiger unveröffentlichter Salus-Briefe,' in ''Österreich in Geschichte und Literatur,'' 24 (1980), pp. 28–34. * Theopold, Wilhelm, ''Doktor und Poet dazu. Dichterärzte aus fünf Jahrhunderten,'' 2nd impression, Mainz 1987, . * Jeremy Adler & Richard Fardon, 'An Oriental in the West: The Life of Franz Baermann Steiner,’ in ''Franz Baermann Steiner Selected Writings'', vol.1, ''Taboo, truth, and religion,'' (eds. Jeremy Adler, Richard Fardon), Berghahn Books, 1999 * Lothar Kahn, Donald D. Hook, ''Between two worlds: a cultural history of German-Jewish writers'', Iowa State University Press, 1993 * Natalie Berger, ''Where cultures meet: the story of the Jews of Czechoslovakia,'' Beth Hatefutsoth, Nahum Goldmann Museum of the Jewish Diaspora, 1990 * Marek Nekula, Walter Koschmal, ''Juden zwischen Deutschen und Tschechen: sprachliche und kulturelle Identitäten in Böhmen 1800–1945,'' Volume 104 of Veröffentlichungen des Collegium Carolinum, Collegium Carolinum München, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2006 * Peter Mailloux, ''A Hesitation Before Birth:The Life of Franz Kafka,'' University of Delaware Press, 1989 * Livia Rothkirchen, ''The Jews of Bohemia and Moravia: facing the Holocaust'', University of Nebraska Press, 2005

References

Sources

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External links

* * * *
Hugo Salus
in the Bibliotheca Augustana.

at ngiyaw eBooks – als

at ngiyaw Sources. {{DEFAULTSORT:Salus, Hugo 1866 births 1929 deaths 19th-century Czech physicians Czech gynaecologists Czech poets Czech male writers Czech medical writers Jewish scientists Czech writers in German Jewish poets Czech Jews German male poets Jews from Austria-Hungary People from Česká Lípa Physicians from Austria-Hungary Poets from Austria-Hungary Burials at Olšany Cemetery