Hermann Deiters (27 June 183311 May 1907) was a German writer about music, and educator. He is known for his writings about Ludwig van Beethoven, publishing the composer's first major biography as a translation of Alexander Wheelock Thayer's work. Life and career Deiters was born in Bonn on 27 June 1833. He was the son of the Bonn lawyer and politician Peter Franz Ignaz Deiters. His father, and all his siblings, belonged to the Catholic Church, while his mother Emilie née Bausch was Protestant. From 1842 onwards, Deiters and his younger brother Otto attended the , which was then headed by Ludwig Schopen. After his Abitur (25 July 1850), he first studied classical philology and history at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn. After one semester, he switched to law because of his father's wish and completed his studies with a doctorate in law in 1854. During his studies, he became a member of the in 1853. His first position (in winter 1854/55 as an auscultator at the Berlin city court) did not satisfy him, so he returned to Bonn and resumed his studies of philology. He attended lectures by Christian August Brandis, Heinrich Brunn, Franz Ritter, and Ludwig Schopen, but he was most influenced by the directors of the philological seminar, Friedrich Gottlieb Welcker, Friedrich Ritschl, and Otto Jahn, of which Deiters was a member for three semesters. In accordance with his inclination and versatile talents, he joined Jahn in particular, who represented broad areas of antiquity studies and was also known as a musician and musicologist. Deiters received his doctorate on 28 July 1858 with a dissertation on Hesiod's Aspis. On 6 November 1858, he passed the habilitation for secondary school teachers and began his probationary year at the Gymnasium in Bonn, where he subsequently taught as an assistant teacher, and from 1 July 1862 as a full-time teacher. On 1 January 1869, he changed to the Gymnasium in Düren as senior teacher. In 1874, he moved to West Prussia as headmaster of the . On 1 January 1877, he transferred to the Mariengymnasium in Posen. As headmaster, Deiters endeavoured to provide his school with material and personnel. He laid down technical, methodological-didactic, and pedagogical principles, as he was used to them from Bonn, and set up student libraries and collections of teaching materials. Finally, he returned to Bonn, where he was appointed head of the Königliches Gymnasium on 1