UHLAND, Johann Ludwig(1787-1862), German poet, was born at Tübingen, on April 26, 1787. He studied at the university of his native place, taking jurisprudence as his special subject, but also devoting much time to literature. Having graduated as a doctor of laws in 1810, he λvent for some months to Paris; and from 1812 to 1814 he worked at his profession in Stuttgart, in the bureau of the minister of justice. He had begun his career as a poet in 1807 and 1808 by contributing ballads and lyrics to Seckendorfs Musenalmanach ; and in 1812 and 1813 he wrote poems for the Poetischer Almanach and for the Deutscher Dichterwald. In 1815 he collected his poems in a volume entitled Gedichte, which almost immediately secured a wide circle of readers, and gives him his place in German literature. To every new edition he added some fresh poems; and the sixtieth edition, published in 1875, included a number of pieces found among his papers. He wrote two dramatic works— Ernst, Herzog von Schwaben and Ludwig der Baier —the former published in 1817, the latter in 1819. These, however, are unimportant in comparison with his Gedichte. In some respects Uhland must be classed with the writers of the romantic school, for, like them, he found in the Middle Ages the subjects which appealed most strongly to his imagination. But his style has a precision, suppleness, and grace which sharply dis tinguish his most characteristic writings from those of the romantic poets. His best lyrics have the charm which belongs to the unaffected expression of delicate sentiment; and in almost all his ballads he displays a remarkable power of giving picturesque form to his conceptions of character. He was a man of pure and noble impulse, and it was in presenting scenes which awaken love, or admiration, or ...pity that he did the fullest justice to his powers. Uhland’s poetic sympathy with some characteristics of the age of chivalry did not prevent him from sharing the best aspirations of his own time. He wrote manly poems in defence of freedom, and in the states assembly of Würtemberg he played a distinguished part as one of the most vigorous and consistent of the liberal members. In 1829 he was made a professor, at Tübingen university, of German literature and the German language, but he resigned this appointment in 1833, when it was found to be incompatible with his political duties. In 1848 he became a member of the Frankfort parliament, in which he sat as one of the most respected members of the liberal party.
Uhland was not only a poet and politician; he was also an ardent student of the history of literature. In 1812 he published an interesting essay on Das altfranzösische Epos·, and ten years afterwards this was followed by an admirable work on Walther von der Vogelweide. He was also the author of an elaborate study of Der Mythus von Thor nach nordischen Quellen (1836), and he formed a valuable collection of Alte hoch-und niederdeutsche Volkslieder, which appeared in 1844-45. He died on November 13, 1862. After his death his prose works were reprinted, with some additions, under the general title UhlanTs Schriften zur Geschichte der Dichtung und Sage (1865-73), and an edition of his poems and dramas, in three volumes, was issued in 1863.
See Liebert, Ludwig Uldαnd, eine Skizze (1863); Mayer, Ludwig Uhland, seine Freiende und Zeitgenossen (1867); and Ludwig Uhland’s Leben, aus dessen Nachlass und aus eigener Erfahrung zusammengestellt von seiner Witwe (1874).
