Wilhelm Busch (Wilhelm Busch)

Wilhelm Busch

Painter and Poet. The first of seven children to the marriage of Henriette Kleine and Friedrich Wilhelm Busch. His six siblings followed shortly after: Fanny (1834), Gustav (1836), Adolf (1838), Otto (1841), Anna (1843) and Hermann (1845); all survived childhood. In 1859, after study at academies in Düsseldorf, Antwerp, and Munich, Busch began to contribute his series of comic sketches to Fliegende Blätter and Münchener Bilderbogen, the leading German weeklies. These were followed by his continuous pictorial narratives with short verse-texts, including Max und Moritz, Der heilige Antonius von Padua, Die fromme Helene, Hans Huckebein, Dideldum!, and Herr und Frau Knopp. Most of the poems from the collections Schein und Sein and Zu guter Letzt were written in 1899. Most of Wilhelm’s works are a satirical spin on practically everything in society, his works were often a parody of double standards. He poked fun at the ignorance of the poor, the snobbery of the rich, and in particular, the pomposity of clergymen. Busch was anti-Catholic and some of his works greatly reflected this. Wilhelm died in 1908. After his death and in 1910 more than half a million copies of Max und Moritz (which was the forerunner of “The Katzenjammer Kids”) had been printed in German, and his works had been translated into many languages. (bio by: Shock)

Born

  • April, 15, 1832
  • Germany

Died

  • January, 01, 1908
  • Germany

Cemetery

  • Cemetery of Meechtshausen
  • Germany

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