Today’s Jewish Birthday: Hugo Salus

Courtesy of Wikipedia

Hugo Salus, 1900s (Photo: Wikipedia)

Hugo Salus (August 3, 1866 – February 4, 1929) was a German-Czech physician, writer and poet. Salus was born in Česká LípaBohemiaAustrian Empire on 3 August 1866. He studied medicine in Prague and established a practice in gynaecology there from 1895 onwards. Apart from his professional activities as a doctor, he published numerous volumes of poetry and short stories, and was one of the more important exponents of German-Jewish literature in the Prague of his day, moving in a circle which included younger figures of the stature of Franz Kafka, Max Brod, Franz WerfelEgon Erwin KischOskar BaumJohannes UrzidilPaul KornfeldErnst Weiss and Kamil Hoffmann. Several of his works were illustrated by Heinrich Vogeler, while Arnold Schoenberg set two of his poems to music. A prolific author, he soon became ‘the acknowledged arbiter of Prague literary taste’, and “the most respected Bohemian poet writing in German” at the time. An early friend and mentor of Rainer Maria Rilke, his verse had some influence on Rilke’s early lyric style.

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Tomorrow, August 4: Silvan Shalom