author
Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
1751–1792
A restless and brilliant voice of the Sturm und Drang era, this Baltic German writer brought raw emotion and social tension to the stage. Best known for plays like The Tutor and The Soldiers, he helped push German drama toward a sharper, more modern realism.
8 Audiobooks
Die Soldaten
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Der Hofmeister
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Der Waldbruder, ein Pendant zu Werthers Leiden
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Vertheidigung des Herrn Wieland gegen die Wolken, von dem Verfasser der Wolken Deutsche Litteraturdenkmale des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts, No. 121, Dritte Folge No. 1
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Der Dichter Lenz und Friedericke von Sesenheim Aus Briefen und gleichzeitigen Quellen; nebst Gedichten und Anderm von Lenz und Göthe
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz, James Macpherson
Der Engländer
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Zerbin, oder die neuere Philosophie
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
Der Landprediger
by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz
About the author
Born in Livonia in 1751, Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz studied theology before being drawn into literature and the lively intellectual world around Goethe and the young writers of the Sturm und Drang movement. His work stood out for its energy, sympathy for ordinary people, and refusal to smooth over conflict or suffering.
Lenz is especially remembered for plays such as The Tutor and The Soldiers, which challenged theatrical conventions and explored power, class, education, and the vulnerability of women with unusual directness. Later critics have often seen him as a forerunner of both naturalism and expressionism because of the bold way he handled character, structure, and emotional intensity.
His life was marked by instability and periods of serious mental distress, and he spent his final years far from the literary center where he first made his name. He died in Moscow in 1792, but his reputation grew long after his death, and he is now regarded as one of the most original and haunting writers of his generation.