Johan Ludvig Heiberg

Johan Ludvig Heiberg, (1791-1860) was a playwright, poet, literary historian, and critic whose romantic idealism in a sense epitomized the Danish Romantic school, which he helped bring to an end when he established a new era of topical, sophisticated, and satirical literature.

Heiberg was a central figure in Danish literature and criticism for many years. During this time he originated Danish vaudeville, a form of popular folk musical, in which critical and satirical verses were set to well-known melodies. Theoretically, he argued in Om Vaudevillen (1826; “About Vaudeville”), vaudeville as a genre was a synthesis of words and music that subsumed in its poetic realism both the lyrical and the epic and thus marked the highest form of comedy-drama. Besides his vaudeville pieces, Heiberg’s most frequently performed plays are Elverhøj (1828; “Elfinhill”) and En sjæl efter døden (1841; A Soul After Death), which was his greatest literary success.