Siegfried Jacobsohn
When he was still a student, Jacobsohn was hired by Hellmut von Gerlach as a theatre critic for the Berlin weekly Die Welt am Montag.
In an interview with the Frankfurter Zeitung published on 8 November 1926, von Gerlach remembered that this sapling had spent literally every evening of his school days at the theatre.
Jacobsohn distinguished himself quickly as a harsh critic of dilettantism on the stage, and did not shrink from attacking the Berliner Tageblatt as a "seat of artistic corruption" in the controversy surrounding Hermann Sudermann's polemic Die Verrohung in der Theaterkritik (The Brutalisation of Theatre Criticism) in 1902.
Jacobsohn explained the similarities of his texts with those of the theatre critic Alfred Gold that following working on his book Das Theater der Reichshauptstadt (The Theatre of the Imperial Capital) in his memory there "slumbered words, images, sentences and whole paragraphs of other authors, memories that could be awakened by the slightest association."
Following a journey through Europe lasting for several months during which he visited Vienna, Rome and Paris he returned to Berlin planning to establish a theatre magazine.
Among the most important contributors to Die Schaubühne were Julius Bab, Willi Handl, Alfred Polgar, Lion Feuchtwanger (in 1908), Herbert Ihering (in 1909), Robert Breuer (in 1911) and Kurt Tucholsky (in 1913).
Even though Alfred Polgar and Kurt Tucholsky still belonged to the inner circle of contributors, they were joined by publicist Kurt Hiller (in 1915), economist Alfons Goldschmidt, satirist Hans Reimann (both in 1917), the founder of the German Peace Society Otto Lehmann-Russbüldt (in 1918), Social-Democrat politician Heinrich Ströbel (in 1919), art critic Adolf Behne, writer Walter Mehring (both in 1920), editor on economic affairs Richard Lewinsohn, publicist Friedrich Sieburg (both in 1921) and as political editor Carl von Ossietzky (in 1926).
After World War I, Jacobsohn promoted the work of Leopold Jessner, the artistic director of the State Theatre in Berlin.
He also followed closely the productions by Ludwig Berger, Jürgen Fehling, Heinz Hilpert, Berthold Viertel and Erwin Piscator.
During the Weimar Republic, Jacobsohn belonged to the few critics who immediately saw the potential of Bertolt Brecht, Arnolt Bronnen and Carl Zuckmayer even though he was already plagued by theatre fatigue.
He managed to obtain the collaboration of film critics such as Hans Siemsen, Frank Warschauer, Roland Schacht and Rudolf Arnhe.
In 1918 he became briefly involved in the Rat der geistigen Arbeiter (Council of Intellectual Workers) founded by Kurt Hiller.
His task was then taken over by Carl von Ossietzky until the last edition was published on 7 March 1933, when it was banned by the Nazi Party.
