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Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen
Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen (1625? - August 11, 1676), German author, was born at Gelnhausen in or about 1625.
At the age of ten he was kidnapped by Hessian soldiery, and in their midst tasted the adventures of military life in the Thirty Years' War. At its close, Grimmelshausen entered the service of Franz Egon von Fürstenberg, bishop in Strassburg and in 1665 was made Schultheiss (magistrate) at Renchen in Baden.
On obtaining this appointment, he devoted himself to literary pursuits, and in 1669 published Der Abenteuerliche Simplicissimus Teutsch, d.h. die Beschreibung des Lebens eines seltsamen Vaganten, genannt Melchior Sternfels von Fuchsheim, the greatest German novel of the 17th century. For this work he took as his model the picaresque romances of Spain, already to some extent known in Germany. Simplicissimus is in great measure its author's autobiography; he begins with the childhood of his hero, and describes the latter's adventures amid the stirring scenes of the Thirty Years' War. The rustic detail with which these pictures are presented makes the book one of the most valuable documents of its time. In the later parts Grimmelshausen, however, over-indulges in allegory, and finally loses himself in a Robinson Crusoe story.
Among his other works the most important are the so-called Simpliclanische Schriften:
- Die Ertzbetrugerin and Landstortzerin Courasche (1669)
- Der seitsame Springinsfeld (1670)
- Das wunderbarliche Vogelnest (1672)
His satires, such as Der teutsche Michel (1670), and gallant novels, like Dietwald und Amelinde (1670) are of inferior interest. He died at Renchen on the 11th of August 1676, where a monument was erected to him in 1779.
Editions of Simplicissimus and the Simpliclanische Schriften have been published by A von Keller (1854), Hermann Kurz (1863, 1864), J Tittmann (1877) and F Bobertag (1282). A reprint of the first edition of the novel was edited by R Kgel for the series of Weudrucke des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (1880). See the introductions to these editions; also F Antoine, Etude sur le Simplicissimus de Grimmelshausen (1882) and E Schmidt in his Charakteristiken, vol. i. (1886).
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