Goltz, Joachim Freiherr von der

(1892-1972)

   dramatist and poet; famous for the play Vater und Sohn (Father and Son). Born in Westerburg in the Westerwald, he entered the civil service* in 1914. Following three years at the front, he settled after the war in Baden. Goltz was soon writing. In 1921 he published Vater und Sohn, his popular account of the eighteenth-century relationship between Friedrich Wilhelm I and his son and heir, Frederick the Great. Later filmed as UFA's* "Fridericus" trilogy—Fridericus Rex (1922), Das Flottenkonzert von Sanssouci (The mill of Sans Souci, 1930), and Der Choral von Leuthen (1933)—the play established Goltz as a favorite among reactionaries. By portraying a rebellious young prince transformed by paternal discipline into the courageous King Frederick, Vater und Sohn served to praise monarchism* while glorifying such celebrated Prus-sian attributes as honesty, frugality, loyalty, and, of course, obedience. It mat-tered little that Goltz s Frederick was mere legend. By advocating the restoration of an authoritarian monarchy at the expense of democratic chaos, his writing helped inflame the Republic's political situation. His war novel Der Baum von Cléry (The tree of Clery) was published in 1934.

   REFERENCES:Garland and Garland, Oxford Companion to German Literature; Kracauer, From Caligari to Hitler.