Friedrich Leopold Graf zu Stolberg

• Born: November 7, 1750
• Birthplace: Brammstedt, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany
• Died: December 5, 1819
• Place of death: Sondermühlen, near Osnabrück, Germany

Biography

German-language poet, translator, and essayist Friedrich Leopold Graf zu Stolberg was born in 1750 in the tiny town of Bramstedt, in present-day Schleswig-Holstein in northern Germany near the Danish border. He was the son of Count Christian Stolberg, a magistrate and manor owner of Danish extraction who was involved in both German and Danish court life. Count Stolberg, a scholar and humanitarian who helped end Danish serfdom, was influential on the dispositions and writing of both his sons, the elder Friedrich and the younger Christian.

Both Friedrich and Christian attended the University of Halle in 1770. They transferred in 1772 to the university at Göttingen and joined the Fraternity of the Göttingen Grove, a literary society headed by the influential sentimental poet Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock. Friedrich’s association with the society stimulated his interest in ancient Greek and English-language writing—particularly the poetry of Homer and Ossian, both of which he would translate in significant editions appearing later in his life. In 1775, the brothers travelled to Switzerland, meeting Johann Wolfgang von Goethe along the way and travelling with him for a time. Although their trip was largely whimsical—the three men dressed like the character of Werther from Goethe’s recently published novel and engaged in raucous behavior—the association allowed the brothers Stolberg to meet a number of influential and inspiring figures, including French playwright François-Marie Arouet Voltaire, German poet Christoph Martin Wieland, and several writers of the Sturm und Drang tradition.

In 1777, after returning from Switzerland, Friedrich’s connections and Danish heritage helped him acquire a court appointment to the court at Copenhagen, as envoy of the prince bishop of Lubeck. During his tenure in Copenhagen, Friedrich often travelled to Eutin to visit his friend and fellow member of the Göttingen Grove, Johann Heinrich Voss. The friendship was inspirational, and the following decade was one of the most prolific periods of his literary life—his tragedy Timoleon appeared in 1784 and his translation of The Iliad in 1778.

Friedrich Leopold married twice: a short-lived and unusually happy marriage in 1782 to Agnes von Witzleben, who died in 1788 after bearing him two sons and two daughters, and then a second marriage in 1789 to the Countess Sophie von Redem, which lasted the remainder of his life and produced numerous children. In 1788, he had become the Danish envoy in Berlin, and in 1791, he moved to Eutin after becoming president of the Lübeck episcopal court there.

He was not to resume his close friendship with Voss, however. While on a lengthy nuptial tour of Germany, Switzerland, and Italy with Sophie, Friedrich met the Catholic theologian Theodor Katerkamp and became greatly influenced by him, converting to Catholicism in 1801. His evolving religious convictions caused a rift with many of his former literary compatriots, particularly Voss, who challenged his conversion in print. Stolberg’s conversion was sincere, however, informing all of his later writing, especially the fifteen-volume Geschichte der Religion Jesu Christi, begun in 1806 and completed in 1818.

Friedrich left Eutin in 1800, shortly before his conversion, living for just over a decade in Westphalia and then retiring to his estate of Sondermühlen near Osnabrück, where he died in 1819.