Christoph Friedrich Nicolai (18 March 1733 – 11 January 1811) was a German writer and bookseller.

Life

Nicolai was born in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, where his father, Christoph Gottlieb Nicolai (d. 1752), was the founder of the bookseller ''Nicolaische Buchhandlung''. He received a good education, and in 1749 went to

Frankfurt (Oder) Frankfurt (Oder), also known as Frankfurt an der Oder (), is a city in the German state of Brandenburg. It has around 57,000 inhabitants, is one of the easternmost cities in Germany, the fourth-largest city in Brandenburg, and the largest German ...

to learn his father's business, finding time also to become acquainted with

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...

. In 1752 Nicolai returned to Berlin, and began to take part in literary controversy by defending

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

against the attacks of JC Gottsched. His ''Briefe über den jetzigen Zustand der schönen Wissenschaften in Deutschland'', published anonymously in 1755 and reprinted by G Ellinger in 1894, were directed against both Gottsched and Gottsched's

Swiss Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina *Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses *Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss Internation ...

opponents,

Johann Jakob Bodmer Johann Jakob Bodmer (19 July 16982 January 1783) was a Swiss author, academic, critic and poet. Life Born at Greifensee, near Zürich, and first studying theology and then trying a commercial career, he finally found his vocation in letters. In 1 ...

and

Johann Jakob Breitinger Johann Jakob Breitinger (1 March 1701 in Zürich – 14 December 1776) was a Swiss philologist and author. Life Breitinger studied theology and philology and first earned recognition from 1730 through a new edition of the Septuaginta. From ...

; his enthusiasm for English literature won for him the friendship of

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (, ; 22 January 1729 – 15 February 1781) was a philosopher, dramatist, publicist and art critic, and a representative of the Enlightenment era. His plays and theoretical writings substantially influenced the developmen ...

and

Moses Mendelssohn Moses Mendelssohn (6 September 1729 – 4 January 1786) was a German-Jewish philosopher and theologian. His writings and ideas on Jews and the Jewish religion and identity were a central element in the development of the ''Haskalah'', or 'Je ...

. In association with Mendelssohn he established in 1757 the ''Bibliothek der schönen Wissenschaften'', a periodical which he conducted until 1760. Together with Lessing and Mendelssohn, Nicolai edited the famous

book review __NOTOC__ A book review is a form of literary criticism in which a book is merely described (summary review) or analyzed based on content, style, and merit. A book review may be a primary source, opinion piece, summary review or scholarly revie ...

journal ''Briefe, die neueste Literatur betreffend'' between 1759 and 1765; and from 1765 to 1792 he edited another book review journal ''Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek''. This latter periodical served as the organ of the so-called popular philosophers, who warred against authority in religion and against what they conceived to be extravagance in literature. His romances are largely forgotten, although ''Das Leben und die Meinungen des Herrn Magister Sebaldus Nothanker'' (1773–1776), and his satire on Goethe's ''

Werther ''Werther'' is an opera (''drame lyrique'') in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann (who used the pseudonym Henri Grémont). It is loosely based on Goethe's epistolary novel ''The S ...

'', ''Freuden des jungen Werthers'' (1775), had a certain reputation in their day. According to the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' Eleventh Edition, his ''Anekdoten von König Friedrich II. von Preussen'' (1788–92), an account of events in the court of Frederick II the Great, has some historical value. Between 1788 and 1796, Nicolai published in twelve volumes a ''Beschreibung einer Reise durch Deutschland und die Schweiz'', which bears witness to the conservatism of his views in later life. The sober narrow-mindedness and grumpy stubbornness of the aging writer, who willingly pretended to be Lessing's spiritual heir, eventually led to the fact that his true merits were forgotten. Nicolai also offered an early account of visual hallucinosis with preservation of insight and unrelated to madness: "suddenly I observed, at the distance of ten paces, the figure of a deceased person. I asked my wife whether she saw it. She saw nothing but being much alarmed … sent for the physician." The visions were beyond his control and could not be elicited at will. In a short story by

Wilkie Collins William Wilkie Collins (8 January 1824 – 23 September 1889) was an English novelist and playwright known especially for ''The Woman in White (novel), The Woman in White'' (1859), a mystery novel and early "sensation novel", and for ''The Moons ...

entitled " Mrs. Zant and the Ghost," the narrator compares the main character to the "celebrated case of the bookseller, Nicolai, of Berlin" in regards to illusions "without being accompanied by derangement of the intellectual powers."Wilkie Collins (2006) The Haunted Hotel & Other Stories: Tales of Mystery & the Supernatural. "Mrs Zant & the Ghost". Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Limited, pp 173-203. Nicolai died in 1811 in Berlin. Nicolai's ''Bildniss und Selbsbiographie'' was published by

Moses Samuel Löwe Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...

in the ''Bildnisse jetzt lebender Berliner Gelehrter'', in 1806.

References

, ''Zur Geschichte der Nicolaischen Buchhandlung und des Hauses Brüderstraße 13 in Berlin'' (1891) *Ernst Altenkrüger, ''Friedrich Nicolais Jugendschriften'' (1894) *Pamela E. Selwyn,
Everyday Life in the German Book Trade: Friedrich Nicolai as Bookseller and Publisher in the Age of Enlightenment
', Penn State Press, 2010. {{DEFAULTSORT:Nicolai, Christoph Friedrich 1733 births 1811 deaths Writers from Berlin 18th-century German writers German booksellers People from the Margraviate of Brandenburg 18th-century German male writers German Freemasons Members of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences Corresponding Members of the Russian Academy of Sciences Members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences Illuminati

Life

References

Further reading