VOLBACH, WALTHER R.

Walther R. Volbach

The theatre historian and stage director Walther R. Volbach began a distinguished career in the performing arts at a remarkably early age. Born in Mainz, Germany on December 24, 1897, he conducted his first opera at the age of 17, and within a few years had built a resume that included work as assistant to Max Reinhardt, the great Austrian director and innovative set designer, and as theatre and opera critic for the Berliner Morgenpost .

A 1918 graduate of Tuebingen, Volbach earned a doctorate at the University of Muenster in 1920 and embarked on an academic career that resulted in over 100 scholarly articles and three books: The Problems of Opera Production (1953), Adolphe Appia : The Prophet of The Modern Theatre (1968), and Memoirs of Max Reinhardt's Theaters (1972). Leaving Germany for the United States in 1936, he continued his career on faculty at several universities, including Marquette and Texas Christian University, and after his retirement in 1965, as visiting professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst.

In the United States, Volbach continued to add to his reputation as a director and producer of operas, and for his scenic design, but he also became noted as a translator of modern European drama into English. He died in Amherst on August 5, 1996.