Hermann Sudermann was a German author and playwright who lived from September 30, 1857, to November 21, 1928. To the east of Heydekrug, in the Province of Prussia (now Macikai and Silute in southwestern Lithuania), Sudermann was born in the village of Matzicken. This village is close to the Russian border. The Sudermann family was Mennonite and came from the Vistula delta, where there were Mennonite villages near what used to be Elbing, East Prussia, and is now Elbląg, Poland. His father ran a small brewery in Heydekrug, and Sudermann went to the Realschule in Elbing for his early schooling. He lived with family there and went to the Mennonite church where his uncle was the minister. Because his parents were having a hard time, he was apprenticed to a chemist when he was 14. He did, however, get into Tilsit's Realgymnasium (a high school) and Konigsberg University to study philosophy and history. Sudermann went to Berlin to finish his education. There, he worked as a teacher for several families, including the family of the author Hans Hopfen (1835-1904). His next job was as a reporter. In 1881 and 1882, he was co-editor of the Deutsches Reichsblatt.
