He studied at the
Breslau,
Jena, and
Bonn, and after living for some time in
Aarau and
Heidelberg finally settled in
Stuttgart, where, from 1830 to 1838, he had a seat in the Württemberg Diet. His first work, a clever and original volume of poems, entitled
Streckverse (Heidelberg, 1823), was followed in 1824-1825 by a popular
Geschichte der Deutschen in three volumes and in 1829 and 1830 by
Rubezahl and Narcissus, the dramatized fairy-stories upon which his reputation as a poet chiefly rests. In 1851 he published the romance of
Furore, a lively picture of the period of the Thirty Years' War; his other writings include
Geschichte Europas, 1789-1815 (2 vols. Stuttgart, 1853), and histories of the
German War of 1866 and of the
Franco-German War of 1870-71. From 1826 to 1848 Menzel edited a
Literaturblatt in connection with the
Morgenblatt; in the latter year he transferred his allegiance from the Liberal to the Conservative party, and in 1852 his
Literaturblatt was revived in that interest. In 1866, his political sympathies shifted once again, and he opposed the particularism of the Prussian Junkers and the anti-unionism of southern Germany. He died on 23 April 1873 in Stuttgart. His library of 18,000 volumes was afterwards acquired for the
University of Strassburg. Menzel was a strident opponent of innovation in poetry and in particular of
Heinrich Heine. ==Works==