Adolf Schults



Adolf Schults (5 June 1820 – 2 April 1858) was a German poet.

Life
Schults was born in Elberfeld, Germany on 5 June 1820 to parents of "little financial means". His father was a foreman in a silk goods factory, while his more-educated mother came from a French family. After leaving school before reaching the secondary level, he entered his father's business. After marrying in 1843, he left this business six months after his father was forced to resign.

He was a deputy editor of the Barmer Zeitung newspaper for a time, but left it sometime before 1848.

He mainly worked as an accountant while writing poetry in his free time, in a situation similar to his childhood friend Friedrich Roeber.

Schults became known primarily for his lyrical works. Among his most famous poems, some of which also contained sociopolitical themes, is the satirical parody Ein neues Lied von den Webern (A New Song of the Weavers), written in response to Heinrich Heine's 1844 poem The Silesian Weavers. Also frequently cited today is his Mother's Day poem Das Mutterauge (Mother's Eye).

He was a member of the Wuppertal poets' circle (Wuppertaler Dichterkreis) in the early 1850s. In Schults' estate, the historian Michael Knieriem found the fragment of a drama by Friedrich Engels, entitled Cola di Rienzi. Schults also wrote a poem about Engels in 1848/49.

He died on 2 April 1858 in Elberfeld—reportedly "excessive work, especially at night time, increased his nervousness and ultimately led to the uncanny chest pain [Brustleiden] to which he succumbed".