Benjamin Neukirch
Benjamin Neukirch was a notable German editor, teacher, translator, and poet born into a professional but financially struggling family. His early education was supported by Count von Bojanowski, leading him to study in various cities, including Breslau and Thorn. At seventeen, Neukirch began writing poetry influenced by established poets like Martin Opitz. He initially pursued a career in law but shifted to academia, becoming a lecturer in poetry and rhetoric at the University of Frankfurt an der Oder. Neukirch co-founded a literary society in Berlin, focusing on gallant poetry, and published significant works, including the pioneering anthology of German poetry, which spanned seven volumes over thirty-two years. He was one of the founding members of the Royal Prussian Society of Science and penned celebrated wedding poems despite never marrying himself. Neukirch passed away on August 15, 1729, leaving behind a rich literary legacy.
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Benjamin Neukirch
Poet
- Born: March 27, 1665
- Birthplace: Roniken, Glogau, Germany (now Glogow, Poland)
- Died: August 15, 1729
Biography
Benjamin Neukirch, a revered editor, teacher, and translator as well as poet, was born into a professional though financially strained German family. His father, attorney Tobias Neukirch, served as administrator and counsel for the family’s village of Roniken and his mother, Ursula Mariana (Reydt) Neukirch, was the daughter of the mayor of Herrnstadt, Germany. Count von Bojanowski in Bojanowo saw great potential in Neukirch when the latter was a boy and paid for Neukirch’s schooling in Bojanowo, Breslau, and Thorn, with the young Neukirch beginning his formal education at the age of eight. When he was studying in Thorn at age seventeen, Neukirch began composing poetry modeled after the works of such writers as Martin Opitz. He received a scholarship to the University of Frankfurt an der Oder, where he studied law between 1684 and 1687, and then worked as a lawyer until 1691, when he tired of the occupation and returned to the University of Frankfurt an der Oder to lecture on poetry and rhetoric.
Upon meeting contemporaries Otto Christoph Eltester and Christian Eltester, Neukirch departed with the brothers for Brandenburg in late 1691. In Berlin the three founded a literary society centered around the composition of poetry, particularly gallant poetry. Neukirch left Berlin in 1693 in debt and his former professor, Samuel Stryck, invited him to teach with him in Halle. Neukirch published his first volume of poems, Galante Briefe und Getichte, in 1695. In that same year Neukirch published the first volume of what would become his best-known contribution to literature, the anthology Herrn von Hoffmannswaldau und anderer Deutschen auserlesene und bi�her ungedruckte Gedichte nebenst einer Vorrede von der deutschen Poesie, a collection of German poetry. The book was the first anthology of its kind in Germany and was published in seven volumes over the course of thirty-two years, with the last volume appearing in 1727, two years before Neukirch’s death.
In 1700 Neukirch joined the Royal Prussian Society of Science as one of its first members and also wrote his best-known poem, “Auf die Linck-und-Regiu�sche vermählung, den 8 Junii 1700,” one of the wedding poems for which he was famed, though he himself never wed. Three years later, he became professor of poetry and rhetoric at Berlin’s Ritterakademie. He died on August 15, 1729.