Sibylla Schwarz (died 31 July 1638)
Born on 14 February 1621 in the German city of Greifswald, on the Baltic sea, the poet Sibylla Schwarz was just seventeen years old when she died. Her father, Christian, was the mayor of the city; her mother was named Regina.
 |
| Sibylla Schwarz, from the 1650 edition of her work |
Little is written about Sibylla Schwarz in English--and, I am sorry to say, I do not read German. Even with the help of Google Translate, there is just not much information to be had about her (at this time, at any rate).
Her poetry, collected in a volume titled Deutsche Poëtische Gedichte (translated as German Poetic Verses), was published posthumously, in 1650, by a teacher. Included are sonnets about friendship and love, but her poetry also includes themes of war (she's writing during the Thirty Years War) and death. She also notes the jealousy of those who resent a woman writing poetry.
And, of course, like so many other women writers, she was compared to the poet Sappho, praised as the "German Sappho."
The few works on Sibylla Schwarz are all in German. For the little I have included here, I'm relying on the now-classic Bloomsbury Guide to Women's Literature Throughout the World, published in 1992 and edited by Claire Buck. (Now out of print, but you can generally find a used copy. It's HUGE--there are more than 5,000 entries!)
