Hans Leybold

Hans Leybold (2 April 1892 – 8 September 1914) was a German expressionist poet, whose small body of work was a major inspiration behind much of the Dada movement, in particular the works of his close friend Hugo Ball. Although Leybold died two years before the emergence of Dada, his absurdist writings and poems represent an important stage in the development of expressionist movement in Germany.

Born into a middle-class family in Frankfurt am Main, Leybold was raised in Hamburg where he completed his schooling in 1911 and joined the German Army. In his compulsory year of conscription he impressed his superior officers so much he was offered a commission and embarked on a military career. Taking a leave of absence to attend university, Leybold traveled to Munich to study German literature and whilst there he fell in with the crowd of German poets and authors who would head the Dada movement post-war. These figures included Richard Huelsenbeck, Emmy Hennings, Klabund, Johannes R. Becher and most especially of all his particular friend Hugo Ball. It was Ball who interested Leybold in the expressionist movement and soon the two of them were soon producing poetry together under the pseudonym Ha Hu Baley. In the company of these authors, Leybold experimented wildly with technique and imagery in his poetry, seeking both to develop his skills and in the process deconstruct poetry itself, heavily influenced by Alfred Kerr and Friedrich Nietzsche. In consequence of his literary experimentation, his studies went neglected and he began to edit and contribute to expressionist magazines, such as Die Aktion and his own work, the short lived magazine Revolution, in which and his colleagues issued their literary manifesto.

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