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Adelbert von Chamisso

Born

in Champagne, France

January 30, 1781

Died

August 21, 1838

Genre

Poetry, Literature & Fiction, Classics

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Louis Charles Adélaïde de Chamissot, best known as Adelbert von Chamisso, was an officer in the Prussian army and a poet, born at the ancestral seat of his family, the château of Boncourt at Ante, in Champagne, France. Driven out by the French Revolution, his parents settled in Berlin, where in 1796 young Chamisso obtained the post of page-in-waiting to the queen, and in 1798 entered a Prussian infantry regiment as ensign.
His family was shortly thereafter permitted to return to France; he remained in Germany and continued his military career. He had little education, but sought distraction from the dull routine of the Prussian military service in assiduous study. In collaboration with Varnhagen von Ense, he founded (1803) the Berliner Musen Louis Charles Adélaïde de Chamissot, best known as Adelbert von Chamisso, was an officer in the Prussian army and a poet, born at the ancestral seat of his family, the château of Boncourt at Ante, in Champagne, France. Driven out by the French Revolution, his parents settled in Berlin, where in 1796 young Chamisso obtained the post of page-in-waiting to the queen, and in 1798 entered a Prussian infantry regiment as ensign.
His family was shortly thereafter permitted to return to France; he remained in Germany and continued his military career. He had little education, but sought distraction from the dull routine of the Prussian military service in assiduous study. In collaboration with Varnhagen von Ense, he founded (1803) the Berliner Musenalmanach, in which his first verses appeared. The enterprise was a failure, and, interrupted by the war, it came to an end in 1806. It brought him, however, to the notice of many of the literary celebrities of the day and established his reputation as a rising poet.
He had become lieutenant in 1801, and in 1805 accompanied his regiment to Hameln, where he shared in the humiliation of its treasonable capitulation in the following year. Placed on parole, he went to France, but both his parents were dead; returning to Berlin in the autumn of 1807, he obtained his release from the service early the following year. Homeless and without a profession, disillusioned and despondent, he lived in Berlin until 1810, when, through the services of an old friend of the family, he was offered a professorship at the lycée at Napoléonville in the Vendée.
He set out to take up the post, but drawn into the charmed circle of Madame de Staël, followed her in her exile to Coppet in Switzerland, where, devoting himself to botanical research, he remained nearly two years. In 1812 he returned to Berlin, where he continued his scientific studies. In the summer of the eventful year, 1813, he wrote the prose narrative Peter Schlemihl, the man who sold his shadow. This, the most famous of all his works, has been translated into most European languages (English by William Howitt). It was written partly to divert his own thoughts and partly to amuse the children of his friend Julius Eduard Hitzig.
In 1815, Chamisso was appointed botanist to the Russian ship Rurik, which Otto von Kotzebue (son of August von Kotzebue) commanded on a scientific voyage round the world. His diary of the expedition (Tagebuch, 1821) is a fascinating account of the expedition to the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. During this trip Chamisso described a number of new species found in what is now the San Francisco Bay Area. Several of these, including the California poppy, Eschscholzia californica, were named after his friend Johann Friedrich von Eschscholtz, the Rurik's entomologist. In return, Eschscholtz named a variety of plants, including the genus Camissonia, after Chamisso. On his return in 1818 he was made custodian of the botanical gardens in Berlin, and was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences, and in 1819 he married his friend Hitzig's foster daughter Antonie Piaste (1800-1837).
Chamisso's travels and scientific researches restrained for a while the full development of his poetical talent, and it was not until his forty-eighth year that he turned back to literature. In 1829, in collaboration with Gustav Schwab, and from 1832 in conjunction with Franz von Gaudy, he brought out the Deutscher Musenalmanach, in which his later poems were mainly published.
He died in Berlin at the age of 57. His grave is preserved in the Protestant Friedhof III der Jerusalems- und Neuen Kirchengemeinde (Cemetery No. III of the congregations of Jerusalem's Church and New Church) in Berlin-Kreuzberg, south of Hallesches Tor. ...more

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Adelbert von Chamisso’s books

Average rating: 3.63 · 4,927 ratings · 441 reviews · 366 distinct works • Similar authors

	Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte 3.62 avg rating — 4,406 ratings — published 1814 — 103 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Üç Romantik Hikâye by Adelbert von Chamisso, E.T.A. Hoffmann, Heinrich von Kleist 3.69 avg rating — 94 ratings — published 1943 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Storia straordinaria di Peter Schlemihl e altri scritti sul «doppio» e sul «male» by Adelbert von Chamisso, Laura Bocci (translator), Enrico de Angelis (prefacer) 3.49 avg rating — 82 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Marvellous History of the Shadowless Man and The Cold Heart by Adelbert von Chamisso & Wilhelm Hauff : by Adelbert von Chamisso, Wilhelm Hauff, Forster Robson (Illustrator) 4.08 avg rating — 25 ratings — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Peter Schlemihl, etc. 3.04 avg rating — 23 ratings — 12 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Reise um die Welt 3.91 avg rating — 11 ratings — published 1979 — 25 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Wonderful History of Peter Schlemihl by Adelbert von Chamisso, Peter Rudland (Illustrator) 4.33 avg rating — 6 ratings — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	A singular história de Peter Schlemihil - O Traje faz o homem - Romeu e Julieta na Aldeia 4.20 avg rating — 5 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Избранное by Adelbert von Chamisso, Адельберт Шамиссо, Е. Маркович (предисловие, примечания) 4.33 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 1974	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte: Textausgabe mit Anmerkungen/Worterklärungen – Chamisso, Adelbert von – Deutsch-Lektüre, Deutsche Klassiker der ... Universal-Bibliothek) really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 3 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Adelbert von Chamisso (?)

“I am a solitary wave in the dark and desolate sea: and the sparkling glass I drank was drugged with misery.”
― Chamisso, Adelbert von, Peter Schlemihl's wundersame Geschichte

tags: gothic, misery

14 likes

“What use would wings be to a man bound in iron fetters? They would only drive him to even greater despair.”
― Adelbert von Chamisso, Peter Schlemihl

10 likes

“In Wirklichkeit war ich schon wach, aber ich hielt noch die Augen zu, um die Traaumgestalten noch länger vor meiner Seele zu behalten.”
― Adelbert von Chamisso, Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte

tags: dreaming

5 likes

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