J. M. R. Lenz was born in Sesswegen,
Livonia (now
Cesvaine, Latvia), the son of the
pietistic minister Christian David Lenz (1720-1798), later General Superintendent of Livonia. When Lenz was 9, in 1760, the family moved to Dorpat (now
Tartu, Estonia), where his father had been offered a minister's post. His first published poem appeared when he was 15. From 1768 to 1770 he studied theology on a scholarship, first at Dorpat and then at
Königsberg (now Kaliningrad). While there, he attended lectures by
Immanuel Kant, who encouraged him to read
Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He began increasingly to follow his literary interests and to neglect theology. His first independent publication, the long poem
Die Landplagen (
"Torments of the Land") appeared in
1769. He also studied music, most likely with either the Ukrainian virtuoso
lutanist Timofey Belogradsky, then resident in Königsberg, or his student
Johann Friedrich Reichardt.
In 1771 Lenz abandoned his studies in Königsberg. Much against the will of his father, who on that account broke off contact with him, he took a position little better than that of a servant with Friedrich Georg and Ernst Nikolaus von Kleist (
http://www.v-kleist.com/FG/Muttrin/fg0091.htm), barons from
Courland and officer cadets about to begin their military service, whom he accompanied to
Strasbourg. Once there, he came into contact with the
actuary Johann Daniel Salzmann, around whom had formed the literary group of the
Société de philosophie et de belles lettres. This was frequented also by the young
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who at this time happened to be in Strasbourg, and whose acquaintance Lenz made, as well as that of
Johann Heinrich Jung-Stilling. Goethe now became Lenz's literary idol, and through him he made contact with
Johann Gottfried Herder and
Johann Kaspar Lavater, with whom he corresponded.
In the following year, 1772, Lenz accompanied his masters to the garrisons of
Landau, Fort Louis and
Wissembourg. He also fell in love with Friederike Brion, once the beloved of Goethe, but his feelings were not reciprocated.
In 1773 Lenz returned to Strasbourg and resumed his studies. The following year he gave up his position with the von Kleist brothers and lived as a freelance writer, earning his living by private tutoring. His relations with Goethe became friendlier: while the two of them were visiting
Emmendingen, Goethe introduced Lenz to his sister Cornelia and her husband Johann Georg Schlosser.
In April 1776 Lenz followed Goethe to the court of
Weimar, where he was at first amicably received. But in early December, on Goethe's instigation, he was expelled. The exact circumstances are not recorded; Goethe, who broke off all personal contact with him after this, refers only vaguely in his diary to "Lenz's idiocy" (
"Lenzens Eseley").
Lenz then returned to Emmendingen, where the Schlossers took him in. From there he made a number of journeys into
Alsace and
Switzerland, including one to Lavater in
Zürich in May 1777. The news of Cornelia Schlosser's death, which reached him there in June of that year, had a powerful effect on him. He returned to Emmendingen, and then went back to Lavater. In November, while staying in
Winterthur with Christoph Kaufmann, he suffered an attack of
paranoid schizophrenia. In January 1778 Kaufmann sent Lenz to the philanthropist, social reformer and clergyman
Johann Friedrich Oberlin in
Waldersbach in Alsace, where he stayed from
20 January to
8 February. Despite the care of Oberlin and his wife, Lenz's mental condition grew worse. He returned to Schlosser at Emmendingen, where he was lodged with a shoemaker and then a forester.
His younger brother Karl fetched him in June 1779 from
Hertingen, where he was under treatment by a doctor, and brought him to
Riga, where their father by this time had risen to the position of General Superintendent.
Lenz was unable to establish himself professionally in Riga. An attempt to make him director of the cathedral school came to nothing, as Herder refused to give him a reference. Nor did he have any greater success in
St. Petersburg, where he lived from February to September 1780. He then took a position as a private tutor on an estate near Dorpat, then, after another stay in St. Petersburg, he went to
Moscow in September 1781, where initially he stayed with the historian
Friedrich Müller and learned
Russian.
He worked as a private tutor, mixed in the circles of Russian
Freemasons and authors, and helped produce a number of reformist schemes. He also translated books on
Russian history into
German. His mental condition however was steadily deteriorating all the while, and at last he became entirely dependent on the goodwill of Russian patrons for the means of living.
In the early morning of
4 June 1792 (24 May in the Julian calendar) Lenz was found dead in a Moscow street. The place of his burial is unknown.
