Agnes Miegel
Agnes Miegel (1879-1964) was a notable German poet and writer, born in Königsberg, East Prussia, now Kaliningrad, Russia. She began her literary journey at a young age while attending boarding school in Weimar, Germany, and gained recognition early on when her poetry was published in the early 1900s. Miegel's work primarily consisted of ballads and songs, and she became known as one of the greatest German ballad writers, with her acclaimed collection, "Balladen und Lieder," published in 1907.
Throughout her career, Miegel engaged deeply with cultural events and received several prestigious awards, including the Kleist Prize and the Herder Prize. Her writing reflected a strong attachment to East Prussian traditions, which aligned with the political ideology of the Nazi party during her later years. Miegel joined the Nazi party in 1937 and was actively involved in promoting their agenda through her poetry and public readings. After World War II, she faced the challenges of displacement but continued to write, publishing works that reflected on the loss of her homeland and traditions. Miegel's literary legacy remains significant, highlighting a complex interplay of art, culture, and politics in 20th-century Germany.
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Subject Terms
Agnes Miegel
Poet
- Born: March 8, 1879
- Birthplace: Königsberg, East Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia)
- Died: October 26, 1964
- Place of death: Bad Salzuflen, Germany
Biography
Agnes Miegel was born March 9, 1879, in Königsberg, East Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia), to Gustav Adolf, a merchant, and Helene Wilhelmina Miegel. At age fifteen, Miegel went to boarding school in Weimar, Germany, where she began writing poetry. After a year, she returned home and, in 1898, met poet Borries von Munchausen in Berlin. Impressed with her work, he published seventeen of her ballads and thirteen of her lyric poems in the 1901 issue of Gottinger Musenalmanach. Also in 1901, her first book of poems, Gedichte, was published.
In 1900, Miegel lived in Berlin training to be a pediatric nurse. In 1901, she contracted scarlet fever while working in a children’s ward and recovered at the Munchausen’s country estate. In 1902, she went to a boarding school in Bristol, England, where she worked as a housemother for over a year and wrote many of her best ballads. Her highly acclaimed Balladen und Lieder (ballads and songs) was published in 1907, leading some critics to consider her the greatest German ballad writer. In 1916, Miegel received the Kleist Prize as the best living German poet.
In 1920, Miegel began covering cultural events for the Königsberg newspaper Östpreussische Zeitung, but had to resign because of ill health by 1926. She received an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Konigsberg in 1924 and her collection of four stories, Geschichten aus Alt- Preussen (stories from Old Prussia), was published in 1926. Miegel’s prose was conservative and reflected her love of East Prussian traditions and history, which fit the political ideology of the Nazi party. In 1933, Miegel was elected to the Prussian Academy of the Arts, which had been reorganized under Nazi control, and was appointed senator in the German Academy of Poetry. In 1936, she received the Herder Prize, Nazi Germany’s most prestigious cultural award. Miegel joined the Nazi party in 1937, and wrote a hymn praising Hitler that appeared in the 1940 Östland: Gedichte (land in the east: poems). She also supported the war effort by giving poetry readings throughout Germany and on the radio.
In 1939, the nineteenth edition of her first collection of poetry was published and the German press began calling her Mutter Ostpreussen (“mother East Prussia”). In 1940, Miegel was awarded the Goethe Prize of the City of Frankfurt. After Königsberg was bombed in August, 1944, and evacuated in February, 1945, Miegel lived in a refugee camp in Denmark until October, 1946. In 1949, she moved to Bad Nenndorf, near Hannover, Germany, and published her first postwar book of verse and another book of five stories. Her last story collection was published in 1951, and Miegel began editing her collected works.
Miegel held her last public reading in 1958. In 1962, she received the literary prize of West Prussia, and continued writing until her death in Bad Salzuflen on October 26, 1964. Miegel enjoyed great literary prestige, especially with the restoration of Germany after World War II. Her work portrayed a county, people, and tradition that were lost forever.