Ferdinand August Otto Heinrich, Graf von Loeben (18 August 1786 in

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth larg ...

– 3 April 1825 in Dresden) was a German writer.

Biography

He was born into an

aristocrat The aristocracy is historically associated with "hereditary" or "ruling" social class. In many states, the aristocracy included the upper class of people (aristocrats) with hereditary rank and titles. In some, such as ancient Greece, ancient Ro ...

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

family, and was educated by private tutors. From 1804 he studied law at the

University of Wittenberg Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (german: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg), also referred to as MLU, is a public, research-oriented university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg and the largest and oldest university i ...

, but moved to

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: ''Heidlberg'') is a city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914 ...

in 1807, where he befriended

Joseph von Eichendorff Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff (10 March 178826 November 1857) was a German poet, novelist, playwright, literary critic, translator, and anthologist. Eichendorff was one of the major writers and critics of Romanticism.Cf. J. A. Cuddon: '' ...

, also meeting

Achim von Arnim Carl Joachim Friedrich Ludwig von Arnim (26 January 1781 – 21 January 1831), better known as Achim von Arnim, was a German poet, novelist, and together with Clemens Brentano and Joseph von Eichendorff, a leading figure of German Romanticism. ...

Clemens Brentano Clemens Wenzeslaus Brentano (also Klemens; pseudonym: Clemens Maria Brentano ; ; 9 September 1778 – 28 July 1842) was a German poet and novelist, and a major figure of German Romanticism. He was the uncle, via his brother Christian, of Franz a ...

and

Johann Joseph von Görres Johann, typically a male given name, is the German form of ''Iohannes'', which is the Latin form of the Greek name ''Iōánnēs'' (), itself derived from Hebrew name ''Yochanan'' () in turn from its extended form (), meaning "Yahweh is Gracious" ...

. Over the next few years he travelled between

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

and

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, meeting

Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué Friedrich Heinrich Karl de la Motte, Baron Fouqué (); (12 February 1777 – 23 January 1843) was a German writer of the Romantic style. Biography He was born at Brandenburg an der Havel, of a family of French Huguenot origin, as evidenced in ...

Nennhausen Nennhausen is a municipality in the Havelland district, in Brandenburg, Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, an ...

. He was involved in the campaign of 1813-14; after his return, he married Johanna Victoria Gottliebe ''née'' von Bressler and spent the rest of his life in

. A stroke suffered in 1822 left him an invalid until his death. Graf von Loeben was a very prolific writer of the Dresden school, and he influenced Eichendorff and

Ludwig Tieck Johann Ludwig Tieck (; ; 31 May 177328 April 1853) was a German poet, fiction writer, translator, and critic. He was one of the founding fathers of the Romantic movement in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Early life Tieck was born in Be ...

among others, but quickly fell out of favour, most later critics viewing his work as bordering on parody. His most important novel is ''Guido'', written under the pen-name "Isidorus Orientalis". Under a second pseudonym, Heinrich Goeble (sometimes just H. Goeble), he authored the poem ''Abendlied unterm gestirten Himmel'', set to music by Ludwig van Beethoven as WoO 150. See Theodore Albrecht, "Otto Heinrich Graf von Loeben (1786-1825) and the Poetic Source of Beethoven's ''Abendlied unterm gestirnten Himmel'', WoO 150," in ''Bonner Beethoven-Studien'', Band 10 (Bonn: Verlag Beethoven-Haus, 2012), pp. 7–32. An article about him can be found in the ''Allgemeine deutsche Biographie'', and a monograph by Raimund Pissin was published in Berlin in 1905. On the basis of these two sources, Porterfield enumerates his known works as "one conventional drama, one musical-romantic drama, two narrative poems, one of which is on Ferdusi, three collections of poems, between 30 and 40 novelettes, fairy tales and everal thousandaphorisms and detached thoughts." He is discussed by his friend Eichendorff in ''Ahnung und Gegenwart'' (ch. 12) and ''Erlebtes'' (ch. 10).

Selected works

*''Guido'', novel *''Das weisse Ross, eine altdeutsche Familienchronik in 36 Bildern'', a novelette (1817) *''Die Sonnenkinder'', short story *''Die Perle und die Maiblume'', novelette *''Cephalus und Procris'', play *''Ferdusi'' *''Persiens Ritter'', short story *''Die Zaubernächte am Bosporus'' *''Prinz Floridio'', fairy-tale *''Leda'', short story *''Weinmärchen'', fairy-tales *''Gesänge'' *''Abendlied unterm gestirten Himmel''

Biography

Selected works

See also