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Administrative Information

Wernaer, Robert M. (Robert Maximilian), b. 1865. Robert Maximilian Wernaer papers (MS Am 2655): Guide.


creator Wernaer, Robert M. (Robert Maximilian), b. 1865.
Title: Robert Maximilian Wernaer papers,
Dates: 1905-1949.
Abstract: Papers of German born author and teacher of German at Harvard University and elsewhere, Robert Maximilian Wernaer.
Extent: 12 boxes (5 linear ft.)
Language: Collection materials are in English, some in German.
Identification: MS Am 2655
Location: Harvard Depository b
Location:

Administrative Information

No accession number. Source and date received is unknown.

Additional Robert Maximilian Wernaer papers are held by the Harvard University Archives.

Processed by: Bonnie B. Salt

Part of the MS Storage project, 2008-2009.

Most of this collection arrived in great disarray. An attempt has been made in the repository to remove items and folders possessing clear titles and the rest remains at the end of series "IV. Compositions by Wernaer" as unsorted compositions.

Preferred Citation for Publication:

Robert Maximilian Wernaer Papers (MS Am 2655). Houghton Library, Harvard University.

There are no restrictions on physical access to this material.

This collection is not housed at the Houghton Library but is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff to determine what material is offsite and retrieval policies and times.

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Robert Maximilian Wernaer (18-65-1951) was born in Jena, Germany in 1865, the son of Anton Ottomar and Alvine Peisker Ottomar. He was educated at preparatory schools and gymnasia in Germany and came to the United States in 1884. He received an LL.B. in 1887 from the Albany Law School and in 1889 he was admitted to the bar and practiced in Brooklyn and New York City from 1889 to 1896. In 1899 he was received an A.B. from Harvard College, an A.M. in 1900 and a Ph.D. in 1903. He was an instructor of German at Harvard from 1901-1903, at the University of Wisconsin from 1904-1905, at Harvard again from 1905-1906, and a lecturer at Harvard in German literature in 1908. He was an assistant professor of German at Simmons College from 1920-1921.

He also studied at the Universities of Leipzig, Heidelberg, Geneva, and Berlin, and contributed articles to many magazines and scientific journals, and was an editor and translator. His major works were: Die Einfühlung und das Symbol, 1906. Das ästhetische Symbol, 1906. Romanticism and the romantic school in Germany, 1910. New constructive criticism, 1911. The soul of America, 1917. The scholar in our universities, 1926. The proposal for a society of scholars, 1932.

He married Esther Upham Farr in 1891 (d. 1919) and married his second wife in 1930, Maud May Parker (d. 1943). Wernaer died in 1951.

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Includes correspondence of friends and associates with Wernaer, subject files established by Wernaer containing clippings, notes, and drafts of texts, a few biographical items, and extensive drafts and final versions of his compositions, including a large group of unidentified and unsorted material. Compositions include poems, plays, and writings concerning World War I, the League of Nations, the spread of communism, and concern for the future of democracy.

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Organized into the following series: I. Correspondence II. Subject file III. Biographical miscellany IV. Compositions by Wernaer

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