JOHANNES

SCHERR (1817—1886)  , German man of letters and novelist, was born at Hohenrechberg in the kingdom of Wurttemberg on the 3rd of October 1817 . After studying philosophy and history at the university of Tubingen (1837—1840), he became master in a school conducted by his brother Thomas in Winterthur . In 1843 he removed to Stuttgart, and, entering the political arena with a pamphlet Wurttemberg im Jahr 1843, was elected in 1848 a member of the Wurttemberg House of Deputies; became leader of the democratic party in south Germany and, in con-sequence of his agitation for parliamentary reform in 1849, was obliged. to take refuge in Switzerland to avoid arrest . Condemned in contumaciam to fifteen years' hard labour, he established himself in Zurich as Privatdozent in 185o, but removed in 1852 to Winterthur . In 186o he was appointed professor of history and Helvetian literature at the Polytechnicum in Zurich, in which city he died on the 21st of November 1886 . Scherr was a voluminous writer in the field of historical investigation into the civilization, literature, and manners and customs of his country . His works have largely a political bias, but are characterized by clearness of exposition and careful research . Noteworthy among his books are the following: Geschichte der deutschen Kultur and Sitte (1852—1853, new ed . 1897); Schiller and seine Zeit (1859, new ed . 1876); Geschichte der deutschen Frauenwell (186o, 4th ed . 1879); Allgemeine Geschichte der Literatur (1851, 9th ed . 1895—1896); Geschichte der englischen Literatur (1854, 2nd ed .

1883);

Blucher, seine Zeit and sein Leben (1862, 4th ed . 1887) . Scherr also wrote the humorous Sommertagebuch des weiland Dr Gastrosophiae, Jeremia Sauerampfer (1873); as a novelist he published the historical novels, Schiller (1856), and Michel, Geschichte eines Deutschen unserer Zeit (1858) which have passed through several editions . With the exception of some of his stories (Novellenbuch, to vols . 1873—1877) Scherr's works have not appeared in a collected edition .