Michael, Friedrich

Writer, publisher

Born: 30.10.1892 in Ilmenau (Thuringia)

died: 22.06.1986 in Wiesbaden

After studying in Freiburg im Breisgau, Munich, Marburg and Leipzig and completing his doctorate, Michael worked as a freelance book and theater critic, writer and publisher. From 1921-31 he edited the magazine "Das deutsche Buch". In 1923, his "Geschichte des deutschen Theaters" (History of German Theatre) was published for the first time and became a standard work (expanded version 1969). His novel "Die gut empfohlene Frau" (1932) became a victim of National Socialist book burning in 1933 - according to Michael's later assessment, this was merely a misunderstanding, as the book was "set in 1825 and had no topicality whatsoever". He had to give up his editorial work.

In 1934, Anton Kippenberg (1874-1950), the director of Insel-Verlag, offered him a job as an editor. Michael was also able to publish unhindered. He concentrated on harmless, entertaining topics that offered the liberal-minded author and his readers distance from life under the Nazi dictatorship. In his novel "Silvia and the Suitors" (1941), he set a chapter in Wiesbaden in 1865.

After the Second World War, Michael, authorized by Kippenberg, set up the West German publishing house Insel-Verlag in Wiesbaden, which he managed until 1960. In the same year, the publishing house was relocated to Frankfurt.

Michael published numerous articles and essays after 1945, including for the Wiesbadener Kurier. Among other things, he described the history of the Insel publishing house, his own career, the move from Leipzig to Wiesbaden and his encounters with Bernard von Brentano, Walter Gieseking and the music publisher Willy Strecker (1884-1958). Michael collected many of these shorter texts in an edition published by Thorbecke Verlag in 1983 in the volumes "So ernst wie heiter" and "Der Leser als Entdecker". His estate can be found in the German Literature Archive in Marbach.