Rudolf Borchardt
Rudolf Borchardt (1877-1945) was a German writer, known for his critical and creative contributions to literature. Born into a family connected to a successful tea trading business, he experienced an affluent upbringing in Moscow and later Berlin. His relationship with his father was complex, leading to a personal and professional break that influenced his literary career. Educated in archaeology and philology, Borchardt chose not to pursue an academic path, instead drawing inspiration from influential writers like Johann Gottfried Herder and contemporaries such as Stefan George and Hugo von Hofmannsthal.
In 1903, Borchardt moved to Italy, where he lived for much of his life and served in the German military during World War I. His political views evolved in the tumultuous context of the Weimar Republic, where he expressed admiration for Benito Mussolini's regime. Despite his Jewish heritage and conversion to Protestantism, Borchardt's family faced persecution during the Nazi regime, leading them to escape arrest in 1944. His literary aspirations focused on the purification and renewal of German culture, emphasizing connections to antiquity and classicism. Following his death, his works were preserved and promoted by his family and associates, ensuring his legacy as a significant literary figure.
On this Page
Subject Terms
Rudolf Borchardt
- Born: June 9, 1877
- Birthplace: Königsberg, Germany (now Kaliningrad, Russia)
- Died: January 10, 1945
- Place of death: Trins bei Steinach, Tirol, Austria
Biography
Rudolf Borchardt was one of seven children born to Robert Martin Borchardt and his wife Rosa Bernstein Borchardt. Rudolf was named after his paternal grandfather, who established a successful tea trading company in Königsberg. During Rudolf’s early years they lived in Moscow, where his father represented the tea company. In 1882, the family moved to Berlin and his father became codirector of the company.
While enjoying the affluent lifestyle made possible by his father’s business acumen, Rudolf was nevertheless critical of his father, whom he felt could have been a writer had he not concentrated on business to the exclusion of all else. Thus Rudolf’s career choice was made in reaction to his father, with whom he broke off relations in 1902. Elements of their strained relationship can be seen in a semiautobiographical short story in which a young man declines to carry on the family business.
After private tutoring, Rudolf enrolled in Berlin’s French high school when he was only eight, going on to study at the Königliche Gymnasien or royal high schools, in Marienburg and Wesel. From 1895 to 1902, Borchardt studied archaeology and philology at the universities of Berlin, Bonn, and Göttingen. He then decided not to pursue a university career.
Borchardt modeled his life on that of Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803), who was a well-educated critical and creative writer and translator. Borchardt also drew inspiration from two contemporary authors, Stefan George (1868-1933) and Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1874-1929). After visiting Hofmannsthal in Switzerland in 1902, Borchardt gave a talk in Göttingen comparing George’s writings with those of Hofmannsthal, a talk so insightful and well delivered that it launched his career as an orator.
In 1906, Borchardt married the painter Karoline Ehrmann; they divorced in 1919. In 1920, Borchardt married Marie Luise Voigt, the niece of author Rudolf Alexander Schröder, a lifelong friend with whom Borchardt collaborated on numerous literary projects. Borchardt had four children with his second wife. After his death, Marie Luise Borchardt and R. A. Schröder founded the Rudolf Borchardt Society and oversaw the publication of his collected works.
Borchardt moved to Italy, his chosen home, in 1903, and fought for the Germans there in World War I. During the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), Borchardt publicly praised Benito Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship in Italy and advocated the same for Germany. While calling for a right-wing totalitarian state, Borchardt initially did not believe the Nazis would follow through on their plans to annihilate the Jews. The Borchardts themselves were Jewish, but had converted to Protestantism before Rudolf’s birth. Nevertheless, the SS arrested Borchardt and his family in Lucca, Italy, in August of 1944 and started transporting them northward. The Borchardts escaped and went into hiding in the Tirolean village of Trins bei Steinach, near the Brenner Pass. Borchardt died of a stroke there.
Borchardt made great demands of himself as an author, wanting each work to be a model example of its genre. He also wanted to purify German culture and to renew it through references to antiquity, the Middle Ages, the Reformation, and classicism.