The New International Encyclopædia/Körner, Karl Theodor

KÖRNER, Karl Theodor (1791-1813). A German poet, son of the preceding, born in Dresden, September 23, 1791. He studied at Freiburg, Leipzig, and Berlin. In 1810 he published Knospen (“Buds”), a volume of immature poems that were received with favor. He was appointed Court dramatist at Vienna in 1813, but he gave up this career to enlist in the War of Liberation in Lützow's ‘Free Corps.’ There he served as lieutenant and adjutant, and there he wrote his war-songs, Leier und Schwert, in which his genius and German patriotism find a high expression. The songs were set to music by Karl Maria von Weber, and had much effect in maintaining a German warlike spirit. One of the most stirring of them, “Das Schwerlied,” was composed but a few hours before his death in battle at Lützow, August 26, 1813. Of Körner's dozen or more comedies and librettos, Die Braut (1812) and Der grüne Domino (1812) were very successful. Zriny, an historical drama, is the most ambitious of his works. The best editions of Körner are by Streckfuss (1834), Wolf (1858), Kofahl (1895), Wildenow (1900), and Gensischen (1902). His Poetischer Nachlass were edited by his father, and published at Leipzig in 1815. Other biographical and critical studies are by Bauer (Stuttgart, 1883), Kregenberg (Dresden, 1892), Rogge (Wittenberg, 1891), Jaden (Dresden, 1896), Peschel and Wildenow (Leipzig, 1898). Zipper (in Reclam, 1900). There is a biography by Peschel (Dresden, 1901).