Biography of Otfrid Foerster

Abstract

Youth: Otfrid Foerster was born on the 9th of November, 1873, in Breslau. His father had advanced from grammar school teacher to the position of full professor of “Classical Philology, Archeology, and Eloquence”. He was a man of superior erudition and spoke Latin as a living language, as did so many members of his generation. It may well be that it was from his father that Otfrid Foerster inherited his profound gift of eloquence. He passed his “Abitur-Examination” in 1892, having been consistently one of the best students in his class. History, classical languages, and mathematics were his favorite subjects, and in mathematics he far outranked his classmates. He was said to have been curiously awkward in composition and perhaps even bad in expression in his native language. This is astonishing in the light of his later achievements in writing and rhetoric. He had artistic tendencies as well. He taught himself to play the flute. He loved theater and particularly enjoyed comedies. In his later life he enjoyed occasional burlesque.