Otto Ludwig (writer)

[1] But ill health and constitutional shyness caused him to give up a musical career and he turned exclusively to literary studies, and wrote several stories and dramas.

It was followed by Die Makkabäer (The Maccabees) (1852), in which the realistic method of Der Erbförster was transferred to an historical milieu, which allowed more brilliant coloring and a freer play of the imagination.

With these tragedies, to which may be added Die Rechte des Herzens (The Rights of the Heart) and Das Fräulein von Scuderi (The Lady of Scuderi), the comedy Hans Frey, and an unfinished tragedy on the subject of Agnes Bernauer, Ludwig ranks immediately after Christian Friedrich Hebbel as Germany's most notable dramatic poet at the middle of the 19th century.

He published a series of admirable stories of Thuringian life, characterized by the same attention to minute detail and careful psychological analysis as his dramas.

In his Shakespeare-Studien (1871) Ludwig showed himself a discriminating critic, with a fine insight into the hidden springs of the creative imagination.