35 Facts About Georg Forster

Georg Forster taught natural history at the Collegium Carolinum in the Ottoneum, Kassel, and later at the Academy of Vilna.

From an early age, Georg Forster was interested in the study of nature, and his father first learned natural history from the books of Carl Linnaeus and then taught his son biology as well as Latin, French, and religion.

In Warrington, Georg Forster learned classics and religion from John Aikin, mathematics from John Holt and French and natural history from his father.

Georg Forster joined his father in the expedition again and was appointed as a draughtsman to his father.

Johann Reinhold Georg Forster's task was to work on a scientific report of the journey's discoveries that was to be published after their return.

However, Georg Forster pursued his own interests, which led to completely independent explorations in comparative geography and ethnology.

Georg Forster quickly learned the languages of the Polynesian islands.

Unlike Louis Antoine de Bougainville, whose reports from a journey to Tahiti a few years earlier had initiated uncritical noble savage romanticism, Georg Forster developed a sophisticated picture of the societies of the South Pacific islands.

Georg Forster described various social structures and religions that he encountered on the Society Islands, Easter Island and in Tonga and New Zealand, and ascribed this diversity to the difference in living conditions of these people.

However, Georg Forster did not want to have his writing corrected "like a theme of a School-boy", and stubbornly refused any compromise.

Georg Forster wrote well-polished German prose, which was not only scientifically accurate and objective, but exciting and easy to read.

Georg Forster often interrupted the description to enrich it with philosophical remarks about his observations.

Georg Forster's main focus was always on the people he encountered: their behavior, customs, habits, religions and forms of social organization.

Georg Forster was granted similar titles from academies ranging from Berlin to Madrid.

Georg Forster travelled to Paris to seek out a discussion with the American revolutionary Benjamin Franklin in 1777.

From his time in Kassel on, Georg Forster actively corresponded with important figures of the Enlightenment, including Lessing, Herder, Wieland and Goethe.

Georg Forster initiated cooperation between the Carolinum in Kassel and the University of Gottingen where his friend Georg Christoph Lichtenberg worked.

In 1785, Georg Forster traveled to Halle where he submitted his thesis on the plants of the South Pacific for a doctorate in medicine.

Georg Forster then settled in Mainz, where he became head librarian of the University of Mainz, a position held previously by his friend Johannes von Muller, who made sure Forster would succeed him when Muller moved to the administration of Elector Friedrich Karl Josef von Erthal.

Georg Forster regularly published essays on contemporary explorations and continued to be a very prolific translator; for instance, he wrote about Cook's third journey to the South Pacific, and about the Bounty expedition, as well as translating Cook's and Bligh's diaries from these journeys into German.

From his London years, Georg Forster was in contact with Sir Joseph Banks, the initiator of the Bounty expedition and a participant in Cook's first journey.

Georg Forster translated the Sanskrit play Shakuntala using a Latin version provided by Sir William Jones; this strongly influenced Johann Gottfried Herder, and triggered German interest in the culture of India.

Georg Forster was, for example, one of the first writers who gave just treatment to the Gothic architecture of Cologne Cathedral, which was widely perceived as "barbarian" at that time.

Two days later, Georg Forster joined others in establishing a Jacobin Club called "Freunde der Freiheit und Gleichheit" in the Electoral Palace.

Georg Forster became vice-president of the republic's temporary administration and a candidate in the elections to the local parliament, the.

Georg Forster lost his library and collections and decided to remain in Paris.

Georg Forster had the opportunity to experience the difference between the promises of the revolution of happiness for all and its cruel practice.

In contrast to many other German supporters of the revolution, like for instance Friedrich Schiller, Georg Forster did not turn back from his revolutionary ideals under the pressure of the terror.

Georg Forster viewed the events in France as a force of nature that could not be slowed and that had to release its own energies to avoid being even more destructive.

Georg Forster had partial Scottish roots and was born in Polish Royal Prussia, and therefore was by birth a Polish subject.

Georg Forster worked in Russia, England, Poland and in several German countries of his time.

Georg Forster worked in different milieus and traveled a lot from his youth on.

Since Georg Forster's published descriptions of other nations were seen as impartial scientific observations, Georg Forster's disparaging description of Poland in his letters and diaries was often taken at face value in Imperial and Nazi Germany, where it was used as a means of science-based support for a purported German superiority.

Georg Forster's attitude brought him into conflict with the people of the different nations he encountered and made him welcome nowhere, as he was too revolutionary and antinational for Germans, proud and opposing in his dealings with Englishmen, too unconcerned about Polish science for Poles, and too insignificant politically and ignored while in France.

Interest in Georg Forster resumed in the 1960s in East Germany, where he was interpreted as a champion of class struggle.