August von Kotzebue

August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue
Born(1761-05-03)3 May 1761
Weimar, Saxe-Weimar, Holy Roman Empire
(now Thuringia, Germany)
Died23 March 1819(1819-03-23) (aged 57)
Mannheim, Grand Duchy of Baden, German Confederation
(now Baden-Württemberg, Germany)
Resting placeMannheim
OccupationWriter
LanguageGerman
Nationality Saxe-Weimar
 Russian Empire
Alma materUniversity of Duisburg
Announcement of two pieces by August von Kotzebue performed at the theater of Bruges on 8 August 1813

August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue (German: [ˈaʊɡʊst fɔn ˈkɔtsəbuː], Russian: Евстафий Леонтьевич Коцебу, romanizedYevstafiy Leontyevich Kotsebu; 3 May [O.S. 22 April] 1761 – 23 March [O.S. 11 March] 1819) was a German playwright, who had also worked as a Russian diplomat.

In 1817, one of Kotzebue's books was burned during the Wartburg festival. He was murdered in 1819 by Karl Ludwig Sand, a militant member of the Burschenschaften. This murder gave Metternich the pretext to issue the Carlsbad Decrees of 1819, which dissolved the Burschenschaften, cracked down on the liberal press, and seriously restricted academic freedom in the states of the German Confederation.