journalist playwright politician poet
Eckart was born on March 23, 1868, in Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz, Upper Palatinate, Bavaria, Germany; son of a royal notary and lawyer Christian Eckart and his wife Anna. His mother died when Eckart was 10, and his father died in 1895, leaving him a considerable amount of money.
Eckart initially studied law at Erlangen, later medicine at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, and was an eager member of the fencing and drinking Student Korps. In 1891 he abandoned medicine for journalism and creative writing.
Eckart moved to Berlin in 1899, where he wrote a number of plays, often autobiographical, and became the protégé of the artistic director of the Prussian Royal Theatre. After a duel, he was incarcerated at the Passau Oberhaus. The success of his 1912 adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt made Eckart wealthy and gave him the social contacts that he later used to introduce Hitler to dozens of important German citizens, which proved to be pivotal in Hitler's ultimate rise to power. From 1907 he lived with his brother Wilhelm in the Döberitz mansion colony west of the Berlin city limits, in 1913 he returned to Munich. After World War I, Eckart edited the antisemitic periodical Auf gut Deutsch ("In plain German"), working with Alfred Rosenberg and Gottfried Feder. In January 1919, Eckart, Feder, Anton Drexler, and Karl Harrer founded the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party), which in February 1920 changed its name to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party); more commonly known as the Nazi Party. He was the original publisher of the party newspaper, the Völkischer Beobachter, and also wrote the lyrics of Deutschland erwache ("Germany awake"), which became an anthem of the Nazi Party. Eckart met Adolf Hitler when Hitler gave a speech before the DAP members in 1919. Eckart was involved with the Thule Society, although not a member. The Society was a secretive group of occultists who believed in the coming of a “German Messiah” who would redeem Germany after its defeat in World War I. Eckart expressed his anticipation in a poem he wrote months before he first met Hitler, who he thought was the prophesied Redeemer. Eckart became Hitler's mentor, exchanging ideas with him and helping to establish theories and beliefs of the Party. Eckart introduced Alfred Rosenberg to Adolf Hitler. Between 1920 and 1923, Eckart and Rosenberg labored in the service of Hitler and the party. In June 1921, while Hitler and Eckart were on a fundraising trip to Berlin, a mutiny broke out within the NSDAP in Munich. Members of its executive committee wanted to merge with the rival German Socialist Party (DSP). Eckart was arrested after the November 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, in which he participated, and was imprisoned with Hitler and others at Landsberg, but was released because of illness. He died of a heart attack in Berchtesgaden on 26 December 1923.
Hitler named the arena near the Olympic Stadium in Berlin the "Dietrich-Eckart-Bühne" when it was opened for the 1936 Summer Olympics. The 5th Standard (regiment) of the SS-Totenkopfverbände was given the honor-title Dietrich Eckart. In 1937 the Realprogymnasium in Emmendingen was expanded and renamed the "Dietrich-Eckart secondary school for boys". Several new roads were named after Eckart. His birthplace in Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz was officially renamed with the added suffix "Dietrich-Eckart-Stadt". In 1934, Adolf Hitler inaugurated a monument in his honor in the city park. It has since been rededicated to Christopher of Bavaria (1416–1448), King of Denmark, who was probably born in the town. In March 1938, when Passau commemorated Eckart's 70th birthday at Oberhaus Castle, the Lord Mayor announced the creation of a Dietrich-Eckart-Foundation and also the restoration of the room where Eckart had been imprisoned. In addition, a street was dedicated to Eckart. All of these have since been renamed.
A fierce critic of the German Revolution and the Weimar Republic, he opposed the Treaty of Versailles, which he viewed as treason, and was a proponent of the so-called stab-in-the-back legend (Dolchstoßlegende).
Quotations: "In Christ, the embodiment of all manliness, we find all that we need. And if we occasionally speak of Baldur (a god in Norse mythology), our words always contain some joy, some satisfaction, that our pagan ancestors were already so Christian as to have an indication of Christ in this ideal figure. " "To be a genius means to use the soul, to strive for the divine, to escape from the mean; and even if this cannot be totally achieved, there will be no space for the opposite of good. It does not prevent the genius to portray also the wretchedness of being in all shapes and colors, being the great artist, that he is; but he does this as an observer, not taking part, sine ira et studio, his heart remains pure. . .. The ideal in this, just like in every respect whatsoever is Christ; his words "You judge by human standards; I pass judgment on no one" show the completely divine freedom from the influence of the senses, the overcoming of the earthly world even without art as an intermediary. At the other end you find Heine and his race . .. all they do culminates in . .. the motive, in subjugating the world, and the less this works, the more hate-filled their work becomes that is to satisfy their motive, the more deceitful and fallacious every try to reach the goal. No trace of true genius, the very opposite of the manliness of genius . .. ."
Eckart saw himself following the tradition of Heinrich Heine, Arthur Schopenhauer and Angelus Silesius. He also became fascinated by the Buddhist doctrine of Maya (illusion). He was described by Edgar Ansel Mowrer as "a strange drunken genius". His antisemitism supposedly arose from various esoteric schools of mysticism. He has been called the spiritual father of National Socialism.
Quotes from others about the person
Steigmann-Gall concluded that, "far from advocating a paganism or anti-Christian religion, Eckart held that, in Germany's postwar tailspin, Christ was a leader to be emulated. "
In 1913 Dietrich was married to Rose Marx.
