August Gottlieb Meißner

From 1764 to 1772, Meissner attended the school in Löbau and graduated with a degree in law from the University of Wittenberg on 18 September 1772.

After traveling through Austria in 1785, he was offered the position of professor of aesthetics and classical literature at the University of Prague.

Meissner's significance in German literature lies in his development of the new genre of the detective story.

He shifted the focus of his stories from the criminal offense and its punishment to the psychological and social sources of the crime.

The genre is also known as Meissner's contribution to the Enlightenment as his works caused a "humanization" of the law by incorporating the social and psychological origins of crime.