Heinrich Blau

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Heinrich Blau (21 September 1858 – 1901) was a German journalist and playwright. Born into a Jewish family in Neu-Stettin, Pomerania, he studied at a Jewish school and at the Sophien Realschule in Berlin, where his family had moved when he was a child. At thirteen he wrote a metric translation of the Psalms.

In 1878 Blau moved to London and joined the German-language Londoner Journal, eventually becoming its chief editor. He then worked for various German publications in London, writing in both German and English. He acted as a correspondent in Germany and contributed to The Nineteenth Century and The Contemporary. Blau translated works between English and German and studied Sanskrit and Oriental literature, which inspired his German dramatic poem Gautama in four acts.

Blau also wrote a German blank-verse drama, Thomas Chatterton, and essays such as Some Notes on the Stage and Its Influence upon the Education of the Masses, and Some More Notes on the same subject, for which he received a gold medal from a London society. He wrote libretti for light operas, including San Lin, and the texts of the opera Das Erbe Judas and the oratorio Samuel, as well as plays like Scherben, Bianca Capello, Die Prophezeiung, and Götzen.

In 1893 Blau visited the United States briefly. He was married to Helene Sundy. He died in 1901, aged about 42 or 43.