author
Friedrich Bouterwek
1766–1828
An early German literary historian, he moved from poetry into philosophy and criticism, becoming known for wide-ranging studies of European literature. His work helped bring Spanish and other national literatures into broader scholarly view.
2 Audiobooks
History of Spanish and Portuguese Literature (Vol 1 of 2)
by Friedrich Bouterwek
History of Spanish and Portuguese Literature (Vol 2 of 2)
by Friedrich Bouterwek
About the author
Born in Oker in 1766, Friedrich Bouterwek studied at the University of Göttingen and was first drawn to poetry before turning more fully toward philosophy and literary criticism. He became part of the intellectual world shaped by Kant, though later he developed a more independent critical position of his own.
Bouterwek is remembered especially as a philosopher, critic, and literary historian. He taught at Göttingen and wrote on aesthetics as well as on the history of literature, producing surveys that reached beyond Germany to Spanish, Portuguese, and other European traditions. That broad comparative interest made him an important figure for readers interested in how literary history was being mapped in the early 19th century.
He died in Göttingen in 1828. Today, he is mainly valued for the range of his scholarship and for the way his criticism connects philosophy, taste, and literary history.