Walther Killy

Walther Killy (26 August 191728 December 1995) was a German literary scholar who specialised in poetry, especially that of Friedrich Hölderlin and Georg Trakl. He taught at the Free University of Berlin, the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, as founding rector of the University of Bremen, as visiting scholar at the University of California and Harvard University, and at the University of Bern. He became known as editor of literary encyclopedias, the Killy Literaturlexikon and the Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie.

Life Killy was born in Bonn, the son of the lawyer Three years later, he received his habilitation at the Free University of Berlin (FU) In 1966, he was elected a member of the Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen.

From 1968 to 1970, he was chairman of the founding committee of the University of Bremen (founding rector).