Hermann Glaser

Hermann Glaser (28 August 1928 – 18 June 2018) was a German politically engaged cultural historian and commentator.

Life Hermann Glaser was born in Nuremberg, and though he became a national figure, his Middle Franconian provenance was always an important part of his public personality. His father was a secondary school teacher. It was from Erlangen that he received his doctorate in 1952. His dissertation concerned the place of Hamlet in German Literature. His university studies concluded, in 1953 he embarked on ten years as an enthusiastic and creative secondary school teacher, first for one year in Coburg and then, as the economic and political divisions between East and West Germany increasingly came to be matched by physical divisions, back in his birth-city of Nuremberg. During that decade he also achieved literary success as the author of a number of school text books with a focus on German and world literature. By 2012 his "Kleine Geschichte der modernen Weltliteratur in Problemkreisen" (loosely, "Little history of modern world literature in difficulties") had reached a remarkable nine editions. In order to give the Nuremberg adolescents under his supervision more autonomy, in 1973 he co-founded a self-administering "Youth Centre", the so-called Kommunikationszentrum ("KOMM"), which inspired numerous other similar projects in other West German cities. The initiative was not without its own risks, however.

Glaser became chairman of the Deutscher Werkbund (loosely, "German Association of Craftsmen") and became a lecturer and honorary professor in communication sciences at the prestigious Technische Universität Berlin. He also taught on the specialist "Culture and Management" ("Kultur und Management") at Dresden International University. After 1990 there were also guest professorships both in Germany and abroad.

Awards and honours (selection)

1985: Waldemar von Knoeringen Prize from the Georg von Vollmar Academy 1991: Schubart Literature Prize 1993: City of Nuremberg Prize 2008: City of Nuremberg Citizens' Medal 2009: Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany 2011: Honorary membership Kulturpolitischen Gesellschaft e. V. (it was the first honorary membership ever awarded by the society) 2016: Wolfram von Eschenbach Prize