Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff

Eichendorff first became famous for his 1826 novella Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts (freely translated: Memoirs of a Good-for-Nothing) and his poems. The Memoirs of a Good-for-Nothing is a typical Romantic novella whose main themes are wanderlust and love. The protagonist, the son of a miller, rejects his father's trade and becomes a gardener at a Viennese palace where he subsequently falls in love with the local duke's daughter. As, with his lowly status, she is unattainable for him, he escapes to Italy – only to return and learn that she is the duke's adopted daughter, and thus within his social reach. With its combination of dream world and realism, Memoirs of a Good-for-Nothing is considered to be a high point of Romantic fiction. One critic stated that Eichendorff's Good-for-Nothing is the "personification of love of nature and an obsession with hiking." Thomas Mann called Eichendorff's Good-for-Nothing a combination of "the purity of the folk song and the fairy tale."

Many of Eichendorff's poems were first published as integral parts of his novellas and stories, where they are often performed in song by one of the protagonists. The novella Good-for-Nothing alone contains 54 poems.

Biography

Origin and early youth

Eichendorff, a descendant of an old noble family, was born in 1788 at Lubowitz Castle in Lubowitz near Ratibor in Upper Silesia, at that time part of the Kingdom of Prussia (now Łubowice near Racibórz, Poland). His parents were the Prussian officer Adolf Freiherr von Eichendorff (1756–1818) and his wife, Karoline née Freiin von Kloche (1766–1822), who came from an aristocratic Roman Catholic family. Eichendorff sold the family estates in Deutsch-Krawarn, Kauthen, and Wrbkau and acquired Lubowitz Castle from his mother-in-law. The castle's Rococo reconstruction, which was begun by her, was very expensive and almost bankrupted the family. Young Joseph was close to his older brother Wilhelm (1786–1849). From 1793 to 1801, they were home-schooled by tutor Bernhard Heinke. Joseph began writing diaries as early as 1798, witnesses to his budding literary career. The diaries present many insights into the development of the young writer, ranging from simple statements about the weather to notes about finances to early poems. At a young age, Eichendorff was already well aware of his parents' financial straits. On 19 June 1801, the thirteen-year old noted in his diary: "Father travelled to Breslau, on the run from his creditors," adding on 24 June, "mom become terribly faint." With his brother Wilhelm, Joseph attended the Catholic Matthias Gymnasium in Breslau (1801–1804). While previously preferring chapbooks, he was now introduced to the poetry of Matthias Claudius and Voltaire's La Henriade, an epic poem about the last part of the wars of religion and Henry IV of France in ten songs. In 1804 his sister Luise Antonie Nepomucene Johanna was born (died 1883), who was to become a friend of Austrian writer Adalbert Stifter. After their final exams, both brothers attended lectures at the University of Breslau and the Protestant Maria-Magdalena-Gymnasium. Eichendorff's diary from this time shows that he valued formal education much less than the theatre, recording 126 plays and concerts visited. His love for Mozart also goes back to these days. Joseph himself seems to have been a talented actor and his brother Wilhelm a good singer and guitar player.

College days

Together with his brother Wilhelm, Joseph studied law and the humanities in Halle an der Saale (1805–1806), a city near Jena, which was a focal point of the Frühromantik (Early Romantics). The brothers frequently attended the theatre of Lauchstädt, 13 km where the Weimar court theatrical company performed plays by Goethe. In October 1806 Napoleon's troops took Halle and teaching at the university ceased. To complete their studies, Wilhelm and Joseph went to the University of Heidelberg in 1807, another important centre of Romanticism. Here Eichendorff befriended romantic poet Otto Heinrich von Loeben (1786–1825), met Achim von Arnim (1781–1831) and possibly Clemens Brentano (1778–1842). In Heidelberg, Eichendorff heard lectures by Joseph Görres, a leading member of the Heidelberg Romantic group, a "hermitic magician" and "formative impression", as Eichendorff later explained. In 1808 the brothers finished their degrees, after which they undertook an educational journey to Paris, Vienna, and Berlin. In Berlin they came into closer contact with Romantic writers such as Clemens Brentano, Adam Müller, and Heinrich von Kleist. To further their professional prospects, they travelled to Vienna in 1810, where they concluded their studies with a state examination diploma. Wilhelm procured employment in the Austrian civil service, while Joseph went back home to help his father with managing the estate.

Love affairs

From Eichendorff's diaries we know about his love for a girl, Amalie Schaffner, and another love affair in 1807–08 during his student days in Heidelberg with one Käthchen Förster. His deep sorrow about the unrequitted love for the nineteen-year-old daughter of a cellarman inspired Eichendorff to one of his most famous poems, Das zerbrochene Ringlein (The Broken Ring).

Military service

In his deep desperation over this unhappy infatuation, Eichendorff craved death in military exploits as mentioned in his poem Das zerbrochene Ringlein:

Ich möchte’ als Reiter fliegen
Wohl in die blut’ge Schlacht,
Um stille Feuer liegen
Im Feld bei dunkler Nacht.

Translation:

I fain would mount a charger
And glory seek in fight,
By silent camp-fires lying,
When falls the dark of night.

— Translated by Geoffrey Herbert Chase

Although Chase's translation weakens the second line from blut’ge Schlacht (bloody battle) to "in fight" this, actually, happens to be much closer to the historical truth, since Eichendorff's participation in the Lützow Free Corps seems to be a myth – in spite of some authorities asserting the contrary.

In 1813, when conflict flared up again, Eichendorff tried to join the struggle against Napoleon, however he lacked the funds to purchase a uniform, gun, or horse, and, when he finally managed to get the money necessary, the war was all but over.

Betrothal, marriage and family life

His parents, to save the indebted family estate, hoped that Eichendorff would marry a wealthy heiress, however he fell in love with Aloysia von Larisch (1792–1855), called 'Luise', the seventeen-year-old daughter of a prominent, yet impoverished Catholic family of nobles. The betrothal took place in 1809, the same year Eichendorff went to Berlin to take up a profession there. In 1815, the couple was married in Breslau's St. Vinzenz church and that same year Eichendorff's son Hermann was born, followed in 1819 by their daughter Therese. In 1818, Eichendorff's father died and in 1822 his mother. The death of his mother resulted in the final loss of all the family's estates in Silesia.

Child mortality

During the period, infant mortality was very high. Both Eichendorff's brother Gustav (born 1800) and his sister Louise Antonie (born 1799) died in 1803 at a very young age, as did two of Eichendorff's daughters between 1822 and 1832. The poet expressed the parental sorrow after this loss in the famous cycle "Auf meines Kindes Tod". One of the poems in this series conveys an especially powerful sense of loss in this era:

Die Winde nur noch gehen
Wehklagend um das Haus,
Wir sitzen einsam drinnen
Und lauschen oft hinaus.

Translation:

Only the winds are wandering
Around the house and moan,
And by the window harking
We sit inside, alone.

— Translated by Margarete Münsterberg

Travels of a transferee

With his literary figure of the Good-for-Nothing Eichendorff created the paradigm of the wanderer. The motif itself had been central to romanticism since Wilhelm Heinrich Wackenroder and Ludwig Tieck undertook their famous Pfingstwanderung (Whitsun excursion) in the Fichtel Mountains in 1793, an event that began the Romantic movement. Travels through Germany, Austria, and France rounded off Eichendorff's education, however, he himself was not much of a hiker. Apart from some extensive marches on foot during his school and college days (for example from Halle to Leipzig, to see popular actor Iffland), he only undertook one lengthy tour, traversing for seventeen days the Harz mountains with his brother in 1805, a trip partly undertaken using the stagecoach, as witnessed by his diary. Eichendorff was less of a romantic wanderer, but rather displaced again and again by changes of location necessitated by his official activities. The following trips, mainly undertaken by coach or boat, are documented:

• 1794 Prague.
• 1799 Karlsbad and Prague
• 1805/1806 Harz, Hamburg, Lübeck
• 1807 Linz, Regensburg, Nürnberg
• 1808/1809 via Strasbourg, Burgundy, Lothringen, and the Champagne to Paris, a month later from Heidelberg to Frankfurt, and from there on a mailboat via Aschaffenburg, Würzburg, Nürnberg, Regensburg to Vienna,
• 1809/1810 Berlin,
• 1813 Neustadt O.S. (Prudnik),
• 1814 Berlin,
• 1816 Breslau,
• 1819 Berlin,
• 1820 Vienna,
• 1821 Danzig,
• 1823 Berlin,
• 1824 Königsberg,
• 1831 Berlin,
• 1838 Munich and Vienna,
• 1843 Danzig,
• 1846/1847 Vienna,
• 1847 Danzig and Berlin,
• 1848 Köthen and Dresden,
• 1849 Berlin,
• 1855 Neiße (Nysa).

Eichendorff as civil servant

Eichendorff worked in various capacities as Prussian government administrator. His career began in 1816 as unpaid clerk in Breslau. In November 1819, he was appointed assessor and in 1820 consistorial councilor for West and East Prussia in Danzig, with an initial annual salary of 1200 thalers. In April 1824, Eichendorff was relocated to Königsberg as "Oberpräsidialrat" (chief administrator) with an annual salary of 1600 thalers. In 1821, Eichendorff was appointed school inspector and, in 1824, "Oberpräsidialrat" in Königsberg. In 1831, he moved his family to Berlin, where he worked as Privy Councilor for the Foreign Ministry until his retirement in 1844.

Death and burial

Eichendorff's brother Wilhelm died in 1849 in Innsbruck. That same year, there was a Republican uprising and the Eichendorffs fled to Meißen and Köthen, where a little house was purchased for his daughter Therese (now a von Besserer-Dahlfingen) in 1854. In 1855, he was much affected by the death of his wife. In September he traveled to Sedlnitz for the christening of his grandchild. Shortly after he made his very last trip, dying of pneumonia on 26 November 1857 in Neiße (now Nysa, Poland). He was buried the next day with his wife.