Franz Grillparzer Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Gustav Pollak

Critical Essay by Gustav Pollak

SOURCE: “Grillparzer's Early Years,” in Franz Grillparzer and the Austrian Drama, Dodd, Mead, and Company, 1907, pp. 30-40.

In the following excerpt, Pollak relates relevant facts regarding Grillparzer's early life and first compositions.

Franz Grillparzer was born in Vienna on the 15th of January, 1791, and died there on the 21st of January, 1872. Fame came to him at the very beginning of his career, yet his long life, consistently devoted to high ideals, brought him disappointments such as have fallen to the lot of few writers of his intellect and character. Prof. August Sauer has prefaced his standard biography of the poet by a telling characterization of the attitude of the world toward him during his lifetime and since his death:

Born in a land which from time immemorial has cultivated German poetry and song, but which in the march of centuries had become completely estranged from the progress...
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