Hoffmann, << HAWF mahn, >> E. T. A. (1776-1822), was a German writer. He mingled weird and fantastic events with situations of everyday life. Hoffmann’s imaginative blend of Romanticism and Realism influenced the American writer Edgar Allan Poe and the French writer Charles Baudelaire. Some of Hoffmann’s stories were collected in Fantastic Tales (1814-1815) and Night Pieces (1816-1817). Hoffmann’s novels include The Elixirs of the Devil (1815-1816) and Views on Life of the Tomcat Murr (1819-1821). His Mademoiselle de Scudéry (1819) was a forerunner of the detective story.
Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann was born on Jan. 24, 1776, in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia). He was an author, cartoonist, composer, musician, opera director, and orchestra conductor. Hoffmann’s life and works inspired the French composer Jacques Offenbach’s opera The Tales of Hoffmann. Hoffmann died in Berlin on June 25, 1822.
See also Tales of Hoffmann.
