Leonorenlieder

Johann Christian Günther

Johann Christian Günther was a German poet from Striegau in Lower Silesia. After attending the gymnasium at Schweidnitz, he was sent in 1715 by his father, a country doctor, to study medicine at Wittenberg; but he was idle and dissipated, had no taste for the profession chosen for him, and came to a complete rupture with his family. In 1717 he went to Leipzig, where he was befriended by Johann Burkhard Mencke (1674–1732), who recognized his genius; and there he published a poem on the peace of Passarowitz which acquired him reputation. A recommendation from Mencke to Frederick Augustus II of Saxony, king of Poland, proved worse than useless, as Günther appeared at the audience drunk. From th