PORTRET BIOGRAFIC: PRIMARUL POET JOHANN NEPOMUK PREYER
A BIOGRAPHIC PORTRAIT: JOHANN NEPOMUK PREYER, THE MAYOR-POET

Summary/Abstract: The study presents the biography of Johann Nepomuk Preyer, the first mayor of the modern town of Timişoara. His complex personality was defined by his remarkable activity both in local administration and literature. The first contact of the young Preyer with education took place in his native town Lugoj; he went on with studying in Timişoara and Szeged, Bratislava and Pest. He had a rapid professional way. Having come back to Timişoara, after he had obtained the advocate diploma, he was appointed in the county administration and began to activate in the political field. The 14 years he managed the Mayoralty of the Banat seat constitute a distinct chapter of his life. He succeeded to change the town shape, to lay the foundations of a modern administration and of a town sharing modernity. He understood the importance of supporting economy and also the bourgeois class. He had not a comfortable mandate, as he had in contrary to pass the difficult period of the Revolution of 1848 and of the years after, with the whole inconvenient picture the event had unleashed. His ambition to succeed in reconstructing the town came true after a continuous effort, and so that was the city father’s real reason to be gratified. His political opinions he had frequently publically exposed led to his removing from that function and to his departure from the Banat. His firstly concerned himself with literature during his youth when started to publish in the papers at the time. He was always interested in the questions of liberty, national movement, and social relations and those were also the main subjects of his literary work. Mayor Prayer stays linked with the modern name of Timişoara, a reference point in the administrative history of the city.

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