In memory of Manfred Klett, 1933–2025
Dornach, 4 April 2025
Manfred Klett passed away peacefully on 2 April 2025 in the early hours of the dawning day – on ‘his’
Dottenfelderhof, accompanied by his family.
He is laid out in the old hall, where the funeral service will also take place on Saturday, 5 April, towards
the end of the morning. The memorial service for his farewell from this world, with commemorative
speeches about his life and work, will take place on Saturday afternoon at 3 p.m.
Manfred Klett was the doyen of the biodynamic movement. He was a practitioner – initially in agriculture
and in the development of the farm at Dottenfelderhof, then as head of the Section for Agriculture
at the Goetheanum with the large annual Agriculture Conference and worldwide networking,
and finally as a project developer, particularly in the village project Juchowo in Poland. At the same
time, he travelled the world for decades as a speaker, lecturer and discussion partner. He had the gift
of finding words and images for the biodynamic impulse that opened up great worlds for his listeners.
The biodynamic impulse appeared great because he presented it as a sustainable continuation of the
epoch-spanning cultural impulse of agriculture – an impulse that means partnership with the Earth
and with nature. It was Manfred Klett's destiny to encounter the magnitude of this development at
decisive points in his life.
Manfred Klett was born in Tanganyika, today's Tanzania, in Africa, at the foot of Kilimanjaro. He carried
the vastness of the East African savannah in his soul all his life. He spent some of his school days
at the Schule Schloss Salem on Lake Constance and, after the Second World War, at the Stuttgart
Waldorf School, with a year-long student exchange in England. His studies at the Technical University
of Stuttgart were cut short by an accident. During a one-year work stay in north-eastern Syria, he decided
to become a farmer. This decision was made in the historic land between the Tigris and Euphrates
rivers – a place of early agricultural development. After an apprenticeship, he studied agriculture
at the University of Stuttgart-Hohenheim, followed by a doctorate in soil science. He then spent a further
four years researching the topic of ‘fertilisation and food quality’ at the Institute for Biodynamic
Farming.
In 1968, the Dottenfelderhof farming community was founded, followed shortly afterwards by the
Dottenfelderhof School of Agriculture. Here, on the outskirts of Frankfurt, within sight of the capital
power of modern times, we see the next significant turning point in the biography of Manfred Klett:
the 180-hectare Dottenfelderhof, the large farming community of five families and the School of Agriculture,
which is looking far into the future. After twenty years of biodynamic development work with
his wife and five children, he took over the leadership of the Section for Agriculture at the Goetheanum
in Dornach, Switzerland. This made the worldwide biodynamic movement his place of work. He
travelled to many regions of the world, and people from over 40 countries took part in the major annual
conferences on biodynamic agriculture at the Goetheanum. After fourteen years of work and a
further eight years as a freelance contributor at the Goetheanum, he returned to the Dottenfelderhof
and resumed a teaching post at the local School of Agriculture. In addition, he led the village project
in Juchowo, Poland, for 21 years. It is an attempt to create a place in Eastern Europe where ‘forming
the Earth’ (Novalis) presents itself as a social task – and where ‘the social question’ finds an answer in
the formation of the Earth.
His extensive book Von der Agrartechnologie zur Landbaukunst (‘From Agricultural Technology to the
Art of Farming’) was published in 2021 as the result of a lifetime of work, research and teaching in
biodynamics. ‘Agriculture as an art’ is the aim expressed in the title of the book. And one may wonder:
can this provide the solution to the challenges of climate change, soil erosion and feeding the
world? The answer may be yes, because art – agriculture as an art – means that each and every one
of us, with our individual commitment, in our very special place, makes an irreplaceable contribution.
Every farm, every place where work is carried out in the spirit of this book, is a representative of the
Earth that is entrusted to us for cultivation.
We are now in the days of Manfred Klett's farewell from Earth, at the beginning of the second century
of the biodynamic impulse, with the question: what is to be done now? Today, we are faced with
some difficult realities on the farms and in marketing. However, we also know the principles and
basic ideas from anthroposophy, from which we can hope not to fail in the face of these realities. We
could develop ourselves and agriculture from the future. In this way, we can not only solve the problems
of agriculture and open its future, but also gain future impulses for the natural side of the world
and the social shaping of human life. Manfred Klett calls on us to do this – in his book, through his
life’s work, through his human greatness. We owe him a great deal and want to accompany him with
deep gratitude on his path from the beloved Earth into the sphere world of cosmic existence.
For the Section for Agriculture at the Goetheanum
Ueli Hurter