Musen-Almanach


A Musen-Almanach was a kind of literary annual, popular in Germany from 1770 into the mid-19th century. They were modelled on the Almanach des Muses published in Paris from 1765.

Development in the 1770s

The first example was Johann Christian Dieterich's Göttinger Musenalmanach of 1770. It was promoted by the mathematician Abraham Gotthelf Kästner, and published by Heinrich Christian Boie. As a literary outlet for students at the University of Göttingen, it received contributions from Johann Heinrich Voss, Ludwig Christoph Heinrich Hölty, Johann Martin Miller and his relative Gottlob Dietrich Miller, Johann Friedrich Hahn, Johann Thomas Ludwig Wehrs, Johann Anton Leisewitz, and others. In 1774 Boie made Voss editor, but Voss soon left for Hamburg and started a competing almanac; in spring 1775, he was replaced by Leopold Friedrich Günther Goeckingk; he was joined the next year by Gottfried August Bürger, who became sole editor in 1779. After Bürger's death in 1795 he was replaced by Karl Reinhard.
A semi-pirated imitation by Engelhard Benjamin Schwickert, Leipziger Almanach der deutschen Musen, simultaneously appeared in Leipzig. Despite including nineteen stolen items, it was on sale before the GMA. The editor was Christian Heinrich Schmid, and in subsequent years it would include the work of Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, Christian Fürchtegott Gellert, Johann Wilhelm Ludwig Gleim and Karl Wilhelm Ramler. From 1776 it was titled Leipziger Musen-Almanach, and from 1782 Benjamin took over as editor.
The third almanac to appear was that of the Johann Heinrich Voss previously mentioned, the Hamburger Musenalmanach. The first issue of 1776 lost money, and Voss transferred management to Carl Ernst Bohn, but continued to edit, with the help of Goeckingk.
In Vienna in 1777, the Wienerischer Musenalmanach appeared. The editor was Joseph Franz von Ratschky, and he was joined by Aloys Blumauer in 1781, and later by Gottlieb von Leon and Martin Joseph Prandstätter. The last issue appeared in 1796.

Schiller's ''Musenalmanach''

Other similar almanacs were less successful, including Friedrich Schiller's Anthologie which only appeared once. His second attempt was Musen-Almanach which is the most famous example in the entire genre, because of the contributors: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Johann Gottfried Herder, Ludwig Tieck, Friedrich Hölderlin and August Wilhelm Schlegel.
Inspired by his example, there followed Musenalmanache by August Wilhelm Schlegel and Ludwig Tieck, by Johann Bernhard Vermehren, the Musenalmanach by Adelbert von Chamisso and Karl August Varnhagen von Ense, the Poetische Taschenbuch of Friedrich Schlegel and the Musenalmanach edited by Leo von Seckendorf.

Mass marketing, and ''Taschenbücher''

The heyday of the almanac was perhaps the 1820s, during which decade they gradually began to appear in England in an etiolated form as literary annuals. In 1823, a writer in the European Magazine of London commented:
The Musen-Almanach was gradually superseded by the Taschenbuch and by the literary magazine as we know it today — some still bearing the word Musenalmanach in their titles. However, short-lived annuals of the same kind continued to appear as late as the 1860s.