01/24/1776, Königsberg - 06/25/1822, Berlin
German writer, artist,
composer, music critic

Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann ... There is something magical in this name. It is always pronounced in full, and it is as if surrounded by a dark ruffled collar with fiery reflections.
However, it should be so, because in fact Hoffmann was a magician.
Yes, yes, not just a storyteller, like the brothers Grimm or Perrault, but a real magician.
Judge for yourself, because only a true magician can create miracles and fairy tales ... out of nothing. From a bronze doorknob with a grinning face, from nutcrackers and a hoarse chime of an old clock; from the noise of the wind in the foliage and the night singing of cats on the roof. True, Hoffmann did not wear a black robe with mysterious signs, but walked in a worn brown tailcoat and used a goose feather instead of a magic wand.
Wizards will be born where and when they please. Ernst Theodor Wilhelm (as he was originally called) was born in the glorious city of Königsberg on the day of St. John Chrysostom in the family of a lawyer.
He must have acted recklessly, for nothing resists magic so much as laws and law.
And now a young man who, from early childhood, loved music more than anything in the world (and even took the name Amadeus in honor of Mozart), played the piano, violin, organ, sang, drew and composed poetry - this young man had to, like all his ancestors, become an official.
Young Hoffman submitted, graduated from the university and served for many years in various judicial departments. He wandered around the cities of Prussia and Poland (which was then also Prussian), sneezed in dusty archives, yawned at court sessions, and drew caricatures of members of the judiciary in the margins of protocols.
More than once, the ill-fated lawyer tried to quit the service, but this did not lead to anything. Going to Berlin to try his luck as an artist and musician, he nearly starved to death. In the small town of Bamberg, Hoffmann happened to be a composer and conductor, director and decorator in the theater; write articles and reviews for the Universal Musical Gazette; give music lessons and even participate in the sale of sheet music and pianos! But it did not add any fame or money to him. Sometimes, sitting by the window in his tiny room under the very roof, and looking up at the night sky, he thought that things in the theater would never go smoothly; that Yulia Mark, his pupil, sings like an angel, while he is ugly, poor and not free; and life is not good...
Yulchen was soon married off to a stupid but rich merchant and taken away forever.
Hoffmann left the disgusting Bamberg and went first to Dresden, then to Leipzig, was almost killed by a bomb during one of the last Napoleonic battles, and finally ...
Either fate took pity on him, or the patron saint John Chrysostom helped, but one day the unlucky bandmaster took a pen, dipped it in an inkwell and ...
It was then that the crystal bells rang, golden-green snakes whispered in the foliage, and the fairy tale “The Golden Pot” (1814) was written.
And Hoffmann finally found himself and his magical land. True, some guests from this country had visited him before (Cavalier Gluck, 1809).
A lot of wonderful stories soon accumulated, of which a collection was compiled called "Fantasy in the manner of Callot" (1814-1815). The book was a success, and the author immediately became famous.
"I'm like children born on Sunday: they see what other people can't see". Hoffmann's fairy tales and short stories could be funny and scary, bright and sinister, but the fantastic in them arose unexpectedly, from the most ordinary things, from life itself. This was the great secret that Hoffmann was the first to guess.
His fame grew, but there was still no money. And now the writer is again forced to put on the uniform of a counselor of justice, now in Berlin.
Longing overcame him in this "human wilderness", but still it was here that almost all of his best books were written: The Nutcracker and the Mouse King (1816), Little Tsakhes (1819), Night Stories (very scary), Princess Brambilla (1820), Worldly views of the cat Murr "and much more.
A circle of friends gradually developed - the same romantic dreamers as Hoffmann himself. Their cheerful and serious conversations about art, about the secrets of the human soul and other subjects were embodied in the four-volume cycle "The Serapion Brothers" (1819-1821).
Hoffmann was full of plans, the service did not burden him too much, and everything would be fine, but only ... "The devil can put his tail on everything".
Counselor Hoffmann, as a member of the Court of Appeal, stood up for an unjustly accused man, provoking the wrath of police director von Kamptz. Moreover, the impudent writer portrayed this worthy figure of the Prussian state in the story “Lord of the Fleas” (1822) under the guise of the Privy Councilor Knarrpanty, who first arrested the criminal, and then selected a suitable crime for him. Von Kamptz, furious, complained to the king and ordered the manuscript to be seized. A lawsuit was initiated against Hoffmann, and only the efforts of friends and a serious illness saved him from persecution.
He was almost completely paralyzed, but he did not lose hope to the end. The last miracle was the story "The Corner Window", where the elusive life is caught on the fly and imprinted for us forever.

Margarita Pereslegina

WORKS OF E.T.A. HOFFMANN

COLLECTED WORKS: In 6 volumes: Per. with him. / Foreword. A. Karelsky; Comment. G. Shevchenko. - M.: Artist. lit., 1991-2000.
Hoffmann has always been loved in Russia. Educated youth read to them in German. In the library of A.S. Pushkin there was a complete collection of Hoffmann's works in French translations. Very soon, Russian translations appeared, for example, “The History of the Nutcracker”, or “The Rodent of Nuts and the King of Mice” - that was the name of the “Nutcracker” then. It is difficult to list all the figures of Russian art who were influenced by Hoffmann (from Odoevsky and Gogol to Meyerhold and Bulgakov). Nevertheless, some mysterious force for a long time prevented the publication of all the books of E.T.A. Hoffmann in Russian. Only now, almost two centuries later, can we read the famous and unfamiliar texts of the writer, collected and commented, as befits the works of a genius.

SELECTED WORKS: In 3 volumes / Entry. Art. I. Mirimsky. - M.: Goslitizdat, 1962.

LIFE VIEWS OF THE CAT MURRA TOGETHER WITH FRAGMENTS OF THE BIOGRAPHY OF KAPELMEISTER JOHANNES KREISLER, ACCIDENTALLY SURVIVING IN WASTE SHEETS / Per. with him. D. Karavkina, V. Griba // Hoffman E.T.A. Lord of the Fleas: Tales, a novel. - M.: EKSMO-Press, 2001. - S. 269-622.
One day, Hoffmann saw that his pupil and pet, a tabby cat named Murr, was opening a desk drawer with his paw and laying down to sleep on manuscripts. Has he already learned, what good, to read and write? This is how the idea of ​​this extraordinary book arose, in which the thoughtful reasoning and "heroic" adventures of the cat Murr are interspersed with pages of the biography of his owner, Kapellmeister Kreisler, who is so similar to Hoffmann himself.
The novel, unfortunately, remained unfinished.

THE GOLD POT AND OTHER STORIES: Per. with him. / Post-last. D. Chavchanidze; Rice. N. Goltz. - M.: Det. lit., 1983. - 366 p.: ill.
Behind the visible and tangible world there is another, wonderful world, full of beauty and harmony, but it is not open to everyone. This will be confirmed to you by the little knight the Nutcracker, and the poor student Anselm, and the mysterious stranger in an embroidered camisole - gentleman Gluck ...

GOLD POT; LITTLE TSAHES, NAMED ZINNOBER: Tales: Per. with him. / Entry. Art. A. Gugnina; Artistic N. Goltz. - M.: Det. lit., 2002. - 239 p.: ill. - (School library).
Don't try to unravel the secret behind two of Hoffmann's most magical, deepest, and most elusive stories. No matter how you weave a network of social and philosophical theories, the green snakes will still slip into the waters of the Elbe and only sparkle with emerald sparks... parks ... Just, daydreaming, do not stumble over some basket of apples. After all, her mistress may turn out to be a real witch.

KREISLERIAN; LIFE VIEWS OF THE CAT MURRA; DIARY: Per. with him. - M.: Nauka, 1972. - 667 p.: ill. - (Lit. monuments).
KREISLERIAN; NOVELS: Per. with him. - M.: Music, 1990. - 400 p.
"Kreisleriana"
“There is only one angel of light capable of overpowering the demon of evil. This bright angel is the spirit of music…” Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler utters these words in the novel Murr the Cat, but for the first time this character appears in the Kreislerian, where he expresses Hoffmann's most sincere and profound thoughts about music and musicians.

"Fermata", "Poet and Composer", "Competition of singers"
In these short stories, Hoffmann plays out the topics that have worried him all his life in different ways: what is creativity; at what cost is perfection achieved in art.

SANDMAN: Tales: Per. with him. / Rice. V. Bisengalieva. - M.: Text, 1992. - 271 p.: ill. - (Magic lantern).
"Ignaz Denner", "Sandman", "Doge and Dogaressa", "Falun Mines"
Evil sorcerers, nameless dark forces and the devil himself are always ready to take possession of a person. Woe to him who trembles before them and lets darkness into his soul!

"Mademoiselle de Scudery: A Tale from the Times of Louis XIV"
The short story about the mysterious crimes that struck Paris in the 17th century is the first work of Hoffmann translated into Russian and the first detective story in the history of literature.

SANDMAN: [Tales, short stories] / Foreword. A. Karelsky. - St. Petersburg: Crystal, 2000. - 912 p.: ill.
"Adventure on New Year's Eve"
“Inconsistent with nothing, just the devil knows what incidents” happen at this time. On an icy blizzard night in a small Berlin tavern, a traveler who does not cast a shadow can meet, and a poor artist who, strange to say ... is not reflected in the mirror!

"Lord of the Fleas: A Tale in Seven Adventures of Two Friends"
The good eccentric Peregrinus Tees, without knowing it, saves the master flea, the master of all fleas. As a reward, he receives a magic glass that allows him to read other people's thoughts.

SERAPION BROTHERS: E.T.A. HOFFMANN. SERAPION BROTHERS; "SERAPION BROTHERS" IN PETROGRAD: Anthology / Comp., foreword. and comment. A.A. Gugnina. - M.: Higher. school, 1994. - 736 p.
The collection of E.T.A. Hoffmann "The Serapion Brothers" is printed almost in the same form in which it appeared during the life of the author and his friends - writers F. de la Motte Fouquet, A. von Chamisso, lawyer J. Hitzig, doctor and poet D.F. Koreff and others who named their circle in honor of the clairvoyant hermit Serapion. Their charter read: freedom of inspiration and fantasy and the right of everyone to be themselves.
A hundred years later, in 1921, in Petrograd, young Russian writers united in the Serapion Brotherhood - in honor of Hoffmann and the Romantics, in the name of Art and Friendship, in spite of chaos and war of parties. A collection of works by new "serapions" by Mikhail Zoshchenko, Lev Lunts, Vsevolod Ivanov, Veniamin Kaverin and others is also published in this book for the first time since 1922.

The Nutcracker and the Mouse King: A Christmas Tale / Per. with him. I. Tatarinova; Il. M. Andrukhina. - Kaliningrad: Blagovest, 1992. - 111 p.: ill. - (Magic piggy bank of childhood).
"Tick-and-tock, tick-tock! Don't whine so loud! The mouse king hears everything ... Well, the clock, the old chant! Trick-and-Track, Boom Boom!
Let's tiptoe into Councilor Stahlbaum's living room, where Christmas candles are already burning, and gifts are laid out on the tables. If you stand aside and do not make noise, you will see amazing things ...
This tale is almost two hundred years old, but it's a strange thing! The Nutcracker and little Marie have not aged at all since then, and the Mouse King and his mother Mousechild have not improved at all.

Margarita Pereslegina

LITERATURE ABOUT THE LIFE AND WORK OF E.T.A. HOFFMANN

Balandin R.K. Hoffman // Balandin R.K. One hundred great geniuses. - M.: Veche, 2004. - S. 452-456.
Berkovsky N.Ya. Hoffmann: [About life, the main themes of creativity and the influence of Hoffmann on world literature] // Berkovsky N.Ya. Articles and lectures on foreign literature. - St. Petersburg: Azbuka-klassika, 2002. - S. 98-122.
Berkovsky N.Ya. Romanticism in Germany. - St. Petersburg: Azbuka-classika, 2001. - 512 p.
Contents: E.T.A. Hoffman.
Belza I. Wonderful Genius: [Hoffmann and Music] // Hoffman E.T.A. Kreislerian; Novels. - M.: Music, 1990. - S. 380-399.
Hesse G. [About Hoffmann] // Hesse G. The magic of the book. - M.: Book, 1990. - S. 59-60.
Hoffman E.T.A. Life and work: Letters, statements, documents: Per. with him. / Comp., foreword. and after. K. Gyuntsel. - M.: Rainbow, 1987. - 462 p.: ill.
Gugnin A. "Serapion brothers" in the context of two centuries // Serapion brothers: E.T.A. Hoffman. Serapion brothers; "Serapion Brothers" in Petrograd: An Anthology. - M.: Higher. school, 1994. - S. 5-40.
Gugnin A. Fantastic reality of E.T.A. Hoffman // Hoffman E.T.A. golden pot; Little Tsakhes, nicknamed Zinnober. - M.: Det. lit., 2002. - S. 5-22.
Dudova L. Hoffman, Ernst Theodor Amadeus // Foreign Writers: Biobibliogr. Dictionary: In 2 hours: Part 1. - M .: Bustard, 2003. - S. 312-321.
Kaverin V. Speech on the centenary of the death of E.T.A. Hoffmann // Serapion brothers: E.T.A. Hoffman. Serapion brothers; "Serapion Brothers" in Petrograd: An Anthology. - M.: Higher. school, 1994. - S. 684-686.
Karelsky A. Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffman // Hoffman E.T.A. Sobr. cit.: In 6 volumes - M .: Khudozh. lit., 1991-2000. - T. 1. - S. 5-26.
Mistler J. Life of Hoffmann / Per. from fr. A. Frankovsky. - L.: Academia, 1929. - 231 p.
Piskunova S. Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffman // Encyclopedia for Children: Vol. 15: World Literature: Part 2: XIX and XX centuries. - M.: Avanta +, 2001. - S. 31-38.
Fuman F. Little Tsakhes, nicknamed Zinnober // Meeting: Tales and Essays of GDR Writers about the Sturm und Drang and Romanticism. - M., 1983. - S. 419-434.
Kharitonov M. Tales and life of Hoffmann: Preface // Hoffman E.T.A. Little Tsakhes, nicknamed Zinnober. - Saratov: Privolzhsk. book. publishing house, 1984. - S. 5-16.
The Artistic World of E.T.A. Hoffmann: [Sat. articles]. - M.: Nauka, 1982. - 295 p.: ill.
Zweig S. E. T. A. Hoffman: Preface to the French edition of "Princess Brambilla" // Zweig S. Sobr. cit.: In 9 vols. - M.: Bibliosfera, 1997. - T. 9. - S. 400-402.
Shcherbakova I. Drawings by E.T.A. Hoffmann // Panorama of the Arts: Issue. 11. - M.: Sov. artist, 1988. - S. 393-413.

Hoffmann, Ernst Theodor Amadeus (Wilhelm), one of the most original and fantastic German writers, was born January 24, 1774 in Konigsberg, died July 24, 1822 in Berlin.

A lawyer by education, he chose the judicial profession, in 1800 he became an assessor of the chamberlain in Berlin, but soon, for several insulting caricatures, he was transferred to the service in Warsaw, and with the invasion of the French in 1806, he finally lost his post. Possessing remarkable musical talent, he existed as music lessons, articles in music magazines, was an opera bandmaster in Bamberg (1808), Dresden and Leipzig (1813-15). In 1816, Hoffmann again received a position as a member of the royal chamberlain in Berlin, where he died after excruciating suffering from a spinal cord.

Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann. self-portrait

He has been passionate about music since his youth. In Poznań, he staged Goethe's operetta Joke, Cunning and Revenge; in Warsaw - "Merry Musicians" by Brentano and, moreover, operas: "The Canon of Milan" and "Love and Jealousy", the text of which he himself composed according to foreign models. He also wrote music for Werner's Cross on the Baltic Sea and Fouquet's opera adaptation of Fouquet's Ondine for the Berlin theater.

An invitation to collect articles scattered in the Musical Gazette prompted him to publish a collection of short stories, Fantasies in the Manner of Callot (1814), which aroused considerable interest and earned him the nickname "Hoffmann-Callot". This was followed by: "Vision on the battlefield of Dresden" (1814); the novel Elixirs of Satan (1816); the story-tale "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King" (1816); the collection "Night Studies" (1817); essay "The Extraordinary Sufferings of a Theater Director" (1818); the collection "The Serapion Brothers" (1819-1821, which includes the famous masterpieces "Master Martin-bochar and his apprentices", "Mademoiselle de Scudery", "Arthur's Hall", "Doge and Dogaressa"); fairy tales "Little Tsakhes, nicknamed Zinnober" (1819); "Princess Brambilla" (1821); novels "Lord of the Fleas" (1822); "Worldly views of the cat Murr" (1821) and a number of later works.

Geniuses and villains. Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann

Hoffmann was an extremely original personality, gifted with extraordinary talents, wild, intemperate, passionately devoted to nighttime revelry, but at the same time an excellent business man and lawyer. With a sharp and healthy rationality, thanks to which he quickly noticed the weak and ridiculous sides of phenomena and things, he, however, was distinguished by all kinds of fantastic views and an amazing belief in demonism. Eccentric in his inspiration, epicurean to the point of effeminacy and stoic to the point of rigidity, a science fiction writer to the ugliest madness and a witty mocker to the point of unimaginative prosaicness, he combined in himself the strangest opposites, which are characteristic of most of the plots of his stories. In all his works, the absence of calmness is noticed first of all. His imagination and humor irresistibly draw the reader along. Gloomy images are constant companions of action; the wild-demonic breaks even into the everyday world of philistine modernity. But even in the most fantastic, formless works, the features of Hoffmann's great talent, his genius, his ebullient wit, are manifested.

As a music critic, he stood for G. Spontini and Italian music against C. M. f. Weber and the flourishing German opera, but contributed to the understanding Mozart and Beethoven. Hoffmann was also an excellent caricaturist; he owns several cartoons of

literary life Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann(Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann) was short: in 1814 the first book of his stories was published - “Fantasy in the manner of Callot”, enthusiastically received by the German reading public, and in 1822 the writer, who had long suffered from a serious illness, died. By this time, Hoffmann was read and revered not only in Germany; in the 1920s and 1930s, his short stories, fairy tales, and novels were translated in France and England; in 1822, the journal Library for Reading published Hoffmann's short story The Scuderi Maiden in Russian. The posthumous fame of this remarkable writer outlived him for a long time, and although there were periods of decline in it (especially in Hoffmann's homeland, in Germany), today, one hundred and sixty years after his death, a wave of interest in Hoffmann has risen again, he has again become one of the most widely read German authors of the 19th century, his works are published and reprinted, and the scientific Hoffmannian is replenished with new works. None of the German romantic writers, among whom Hoffmann belonged, received such truly world recognition.

The story of Hoffmann's life is the story of an unceasing struggle for a piece of bread, for finding oneself in art, for one's dignity as a person and an artist. Echoes of this struggle are full of his works.

Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann, who later changed his third name to Amadeus, in honor of Mozart's favorite composer, was born in 1776 in Königsberg, the son of a lawyer. His parents separated when he was in his third year. Hoffmann grew up in his mother's family, guarded by his uncle, Otto Wilhelm Dörfer, also a lawyer. In the Dörfer house, everyone gradually played music, Hoffmann also began to teach music, for which they invited the cathedral organist Podbelsky. The boy showed extraordinary abilities and soon began to compose small pieces of music; He also studied drawing, and also not without success. However, with the obvious inclination of the young Hoffmann to art, the family, where all the men were lawyers, chose the same profession for him in advance. At school, and then at the university, where Hoffmann entered in 1792, he became friends with Theodor Gippel, the nephew of the then famous humorist Theodor Gottlieb Gippel - communication with him did not go unnoticed for Hoffmann. After graduating from the university and after a short practice in the court of the city of Glogau (Glogow), Hoffmann travels to Berlin, where he successfully passes the exam for the rank of assessor and is assigned to Poznan. Subsequently, he will prove himself as an excellent musician - composer, conductor, singer, as a talented artist - draftsman and decorator, as an outstanding writer; but he was also a knowledgeable and efficient lawyer. Possessing a great capacity for work, this amazing person did not treat any of his activities carelessly and did nothing half-heartedly. In 1802, a scandal erupted in Poznan: Hoffmann drew a caricature of a Prussian general, a rude martinet who despised civilians; he complained to the king. Hoffmann was transferred, or rather exiled, to Plock, a small Polish town, which in 1793 went to Prussia. Shortly before his departure, he married Michalina Tshtsinskaya-Rorer, who was to share with him all the hardships of his unsettled, wandering life. The monotonous existence in Plock, a remote province far from art, oppresses Hoffmann. He writes in his diary: “The Muse disappeared. Archival dust obscures before me any prospect of the future. And yet the years spent in Plock are not wasted: Hoffmann reads a lot - his cousin sends him magazines and books from Berlin; Wigleb's book, The Teaching of Natural Magic and All Kinds of Entertaining and Useful Tricks, which was popular in those years, falls into his hands, from which he will draw some ideas for his future stories; his first literary experiments also belong to this time.

In 1804, Hoffmann managed to transfer to Warsaw. Here he devotes all his leisure time to music, draws closer to the theater, achieves the staging of several of his musical stage works, paints the concert hall with frescoes. The beginning of his friendship with Julius Eduard Gitzig, a lawyer and lover of literature, dates back to the Warsaw period of Hoffmann's life. Gitzig, the future biographer of Hoffmann, introduces him to the works of the Romantics, to their aesthetic theories. November 28, 1806 Warsaw is occupied by Napoleonic troops, the Prussian administration is dissolved, - Hoffmann is free and can devote himself to art, but is deprived of a livelihood. He is forced to send his wife and one-year-old daughter to Poznan, to relatives, because he has nothing to support them. He himself goes to Berlin, but even there he survives only by odd jobs, until he receives an offer to take the place of bandmaster at the Bamberg Theater.

The years spent by Hoffmann in the ancient Bavarian city of Bamberg (1808 - 1813) are the heyday of his musical and creative and musical and pedagogical activity. At this time, his collaboration with the Leipzig "General Musical Gazette" begins, where he publishes articles on music and publishes his first "musical novel" "Cavalier Gluck" (1809). Staying in Bamberg is marked by one of the most profound and tragic experiences of Hoffmann - a hopeless love for his young student Julia Mark. Julia was pretty, artistic and had a charming voice. In the images of the singers that Hoffmann will create later, her features will be visible. The prudent consul Mark married off her daughter to a wealthy Hamburg businessman. Julia's marriage and her departure from Bamberg were a heavy blow for Hoffmann. In a few years he will write the novel Elixirs of the Devil; the scene where the sinful monk Medard unexpectedly witnesses the tonsure of his passionately beloved Aurelius, the description of his torment at the thought that his beloved is being separated from him forever, will remain one of the most penetrating and tragic pages of world literature. In the difficult days of parting with Julia, the novel "Don Juan" poured out from the pen of Hoffmann. The image of the "mad musician", bandmaster and composer Johannes Kreisler, the second "I" of Hoffmann himself, the confidant of his most dear thoughts and feelings, - the image that will accompany Hoffmann throughout his literary activity, was also born in Bamberg, where Hoffmann knew all the bitterness of the fate of the artist, forced to serve the tribal and monetary nobility. He conceives a book of short stories, "Fantasy in the manner of Callot", which Kunz, a Bamberg wine and bookseller, volunteered to publish. An outstanding draftsman himself, Hoffmann highly appreciated the caustic and elegant drawings - the “capriccio” of the 17th-century French graphic artist Jacques Callot, and since his own stories were also very caustic and bizarre, he was attracted by the idea of ​​likening them to the creations of the French master.

The next stations on Hoffmann's life path are Dresden, Leipzig and again Berlin. He accepts the offer of the impresario of the Seconda Opera House, whose troupe played alternately in Leipzig and Dresden, to take the place of conductor, and in the spring of 1813 he leaves Bamberg. Now Hoffmann devotes more and more time and energy to literature. In a letter to Kunz dated August 19, 1813, he writes: “It is not surprising that in our gloomy, unfortunate time, when a person barely survives from day to day and still has to rejoice in it, writing has so fascinated me - it seems to me that a wonderful kingdom that is born from my inner world and, taking on flesh, separates me from the outer world.

In the outer world, which closely surrounded Hoffmann, the war was still raging at that time: the remnants of the Napoleonic army defeated in Russia fought fiercely in Saxony. “Hoffmann witnessed the bloody battles on the banks of the Elbe and the siege of Dresden. He leaves for Leipzig and, trying to get rid of difficult impressions, writes "The Golden Pot - a fairy tale from new times." Work with Seconda did not go smoothly, once Hoffmann quarreled with him during the performance and was refused a place. He asks Gippel, who has become a major Prussian official, to get him a position in the Ministry of Justice, and in the fall of 1814 he moves to Berlin. In the Prussian capital, Hoffmann spends the last years of his life, unusually fruitful for his literary work. Here he formed a circle of friends and like-minded people, among them writers - Friedrich de la Motte Fouquet, Adelbert Chamisso, actor Ludwig Devrient. One after another, his books are published: the novel "Devil's Elixirs" (1816), the collection "Night Stories" (1817), the fairy tale story "Little Tsakhes, nicknamed Zinnober" (1819), "The Serapion Brothers" - a cycle of stories, combined, like the Decameron by Boccaccio, with a plot frame (1819 - 1821), the unfinished novel "The everyday views of the cat Murr, coupled with fragments of the biography of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler, accidentally surviving in waste paper" (1819 - 1821), the story-tale "Lord of the Fleas" (1822 )

The political reaction that reigned in Europe after 1814 overshadowed the last years of the writer's life. Appointed to a special commission investigating the cases of the so-called demagogues - students involved in political unrest, and other opposition-minded persons, Hoffmann could not come to terms with the "impudent violation of the laws" that took place during the investigation. He had a skirmish with the police director Kampts, and he was removed from the commission. Hoffmann settled accounts with Kampz in his own way: he immortalized him in the story "Lord of the Fleas" in the caricature image of the Privy Councilor Knarrpanty. Having learned in what form Hoffmann portrayed him, Kampts tried to prevent the publication of the story. Moreover: Hoffmann was brought to trial for insulting a commission appointed by the king. Only the testimony of a doctor, certifying that Hoffmann was seriously ill, suspended further persecution.

Hoffmann was really seriously ill. Damage to the spinal cord led to a rapidly developing paralysis. In one of the last stories - "The Corner Window" - in the person of a cousin who "lost the use of his legs" and was only able to observe life through the window, Hoffmann described himself. On June 24, 1822, he died.

The work of Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann (1776-1822)

One of the brightest representatives of late German romanticism - THIS. Hoffman who was a unique individual. He combined the talent of a composer, conductor, director, painter, writer and critic. Quite original described the biography of Hoffmann A.I. Herzen in his early article “Hoffmann”: “Every single day, late in the evening, some person appeared in a wine cellar in Berlin; drank one bottle after another and sat until dawn. But don't imagine an ordinary drunkard; No! The more he drank, the higher his fantasy soared, the brighter, the more fiery humor poured out on everything around him, the more abundantly the witticisms flared up.About the very work of Hoffmann, Herzen wrote the following: “Some stories breathe something gloomy, deep, mysterious; others are pranks of unbridled fantasy, written in the fumes of bacchanalia.<…>Idiosyncrasy, convulsively wrapping around a person's whole life around some thought, madness, subverting the poles of mental life; magnetism, a magical power that powerfully subjugates one person to the will of another - opens up a huge field for Hoffmann's fiery imagination.

The main principle of Hoffmann's poetics is the combination of the real and the fantastic, the ordinary with the unusual, showing the ordinary through the unusual. In "Little Tsakhes", as in "The Golden Pot", treating the material ironically, Hoffmann puts the fantastic in a paradoxical relationship with the most everyday phenomena. Reality, everyday life becomes interesting for him with the help of romantic means. Perhaps the first among the romantics, Hoffmann introduced the modern city into the sphere of artistic reflection of life. The high opposition of romantic spirituality to the surrounding being takes place in him against the background and on the basis of real German life, which in the art of this romance turns into a fantastically evil force. Spirituality and materiality come into conflict here. Hoffmann showed with great force the deadening power of things.

The acuteness of the feeling of contradiction between the ideal and reality was realized in the famous Hoffmannian dual world. The dull and vulgar prose of everyday life was opposed to the sphere of high feelings, the ability to hear the music of the universe. Typologically, all the heroes of Hoffmann are divided into musicians and non-musicians. Musicians are spiritual enthusiasts, romantic dreamers, people endowed with inner fragmentation. Non-musicians are people reconciled with life and with themselves. The musician is forced to live not only in the realm of the golden dreams of a poetic dream, but also constantly confronted with non-poetic reality. This gives rise to irony, which is directed not only to the real world, but also to the world of poetic dreams. Irony becomes a way to resolve the contradictions of modern life. The sublime is reduced to the ordinary, the ordinary rises to the sublime - this is seen as the duality of romantic irony. For Hoffmann, the idea of ​​a romantic synthesis of the arts was important, which is achieved through the interpenetration of literature, music and painting. Hoffmann's heroes constantly listen to the music of his favorite composers: Christoph Gluck, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, turn to the painting of Leonardo da Vinci, Jacques Callot. Being both a poet and a painter, Hoffmann created a musical-pictorial-poetic style.

The synthesis of arts determined the originality of the internal structure of the text. The composition of prose texts resembles a sonata-symphonic form, which consists of four parts. The first part outlines the main themes of the work. In the second and third parts there is their contrasting opposition, in the fourth part they merge, forming a synthesis.

There are two types of fantasy in Hoffmann's work. On the one hand, joyful, poetic, fairy-tale fantasy, dating back to folklore ("The Golden Pot", "The Nutcracker"). On the other hand, a gloomy, gothic fantasy of nightmares and horrors associated with mental deviations of a person (“Sandman”, “Elixirs of Satan”). The main theme of Hoffmann's work is the relationship between art (artists) and life (philistine philistines).

Examples of such a division of heroes are found in the novel "Worldly views of the cat Murr", in short stories from the collection "Fantasy in the manner of Callo": "Cavalier Glitch", "Don Juan", "Golden Pot".

Novella "Cavalier Glitch"(1809) - Hoffmann's first published work. The short story has a subtitle: "Memories of 1809". The dual poetics of titles is characteristic of almost all of Hoffmann's works. It also determined other features of the writer's artistic system: the duality of the narrative, the deep interpenetration of the real and the fantastic principles. Gluck died in 1787, the events of the novel date back to 1809, and the composer in the novel acts as a living person. The meeting between the deceased musician and the hero can be interpreted in several contexts: either this is a mental conversation between the hero and Gluck, or a game of imagination, or the fact of the hero's intoxication, or a fantastic reality.

In the center of the novel is the opposition of art and real life, the society of art consumers. Hoffmann seeks to express the tragedy of the misunderstood artist. “I gave out the sacred to the uninitiated…” says Cavalier Gluck. His appearance on Unter den Linden, where the townsfolk drink carrot coffee and talk about shoes, is blatantly absurd, and therefore phantasmagoric. Gluck in the context of the story becomes the highest type of artist who continues to create and improve his works even after death. The idea of ​​the immortality of art was embodied in his image. Music is interpreted by Hoffmann as a secret sound-writing, an expression of the inexpressible.

The short story presents a double chronotope: on the one hand, there is a real chronotope (1809, Berlin), and on the other hand, another fantastic chronotope is superimposed on this chronotope, which expands thanks to the composer and music, which breaks all spatial and temporal restrictions.

In this short story, for the first time, the idea of ​​a romantic synthesis of different artistic styles reveals itself. It is present due to the mutual transitions of musical images into literary ones and literary ones into musical ones. The whole short story is full of musical images and fragments. "Cavalier Gluck" is a musical novella, a fictional essay about Gluck's music and about the composer himself.

Another type of musical novel - "Don Juan"(1813). The central theme of the novel is the staging of Mozart's opera on the stage of one of the German theaters, as well as its interpretation in a romantic vein. The novella has a subtitle - "An unprecedented incident that happened to a certain traveling enthusiast." This subtitle reveals the peculiarity of the conflict and the type of hero. The conflict is based on the clash of art and everyday life, the confrontation between a true artist and a layman. The protagonist is a traveler, a wanderer, on behalf of whom the story is being told. In the perception of the hero, Donna Anna is the embodiment of the spirit of music, musical harmony. Through music, the higher world opens up to her, she comprehends the transcendental reality: “She admitted that for her all life is in music, and sometimes it seems to her that something reserved, which is closed in the secrets of the soul and cannot be expressed in words, she comprehends when she sings ". For the first time, the motive of life and play, or the motive of life-creation, which appears for the first time, is comprehended in a philosophical context. However, the attempt to achieve the highest ideal ends tragically: the death of the heroine on stage turns into the death of the actress in real life.

Hoffmann creates his own literary myth about Don Juan. He refuses the traditional interpretation of the image of Don Juan as a tempter. He is the embodiment of the spirit of love, Eros. It is love that becomes a form of communion with the higher world, with the divine fundamental principle of being. In love, Don Juan tries to show his divine essence: “Perhaps, nothing here on earth exalts a person in his innermost essence like love. Yes, love is that mighty mysterious force that shakes and transforms the deepest foundations of being; what a marvel, if Don Juan in love sought to satisfy the passionate anguish that oppressed his chest. The tragedy of the hero is seen in his duality: he combines the divine and satanic, creative and destructive principles. At some point, the hero forgets about his divine nature and begins to mock nature and the creator. Donna Anna was supposed to save him from the search for evil, as she becomes an angel of salvation, but Don Juan rejects repentance and becomes the prey of hellish forces: “Well, if heaven itself chose Anna, so that it was in love, through the machinations of the devil that ruined him, to reveal to him the divine essence of his nature and save him from the hopelessness of empty aspirations? But he met her too late, when his wickedness reached its peak, and only the demonic temptation to destroy her could wake up in him.

Novella "Golden Pot"(1814), like those discussed above, has a subtitle: "A Tale from Modern Times." The fairy tale genre reflects the dual worldview of the artist. The basis of the tale is the everyday life of Germany at the end XVIII- start XIXcentury. Fantasy is layered on this background, due to this, a fabulously everyday world image of the novel is created, in which everything is plausible and at the same time unusual.

The protagonist of the tale is the student Anselm. Worldly awkwardness is combined in it with deep dreaminess, poetic imagination, and this, in turn, is complemented by thoughts about the rank of a court adviser and a good salary. The plot center of the novel is associated with the opposition of two worlds: the world of the philistines and the world of romantic enthusiasts. In accordance with the type of conflict, all the characters form symmetrical pairs: Student Anselm, archivist Lindgorst, snake Serpentina - heroes-musicians; their counterparts from the everyday world: the registrar Geerbrand, the con-rector Paulman, Veronica. The theme of duality plays an important role, as it is genetically linked to the concept of duality, the bifurcation of an internally unified world. In his works, Hoffmann tried to present a person in two opposite images of spiritual and earthly life and to depict an existential and everyday person. In the emergence of doubles, the author sees the tragedy of human existence, because with the appearance of a double, the hero loses integrity and breaks up into many separate human destinies. There is no unity in Anselm; love for Veronica and for the embodiment of the highest spiritual principle, Serpentina, live in him at the same time. As a result, the spiritual principle wins, the hero overcomes the fragmentation of the soul by the power of his love for Serpentina, and becomes a true musician. As a reward, he receives a golden pot and settles in Atlantis - the world of endless topos. This is a fabulously poetic world in which the archivist rules. The world of the final topos is connected with Dresden, which is dominated by dark forces.

The image of the golden pot in the title of the novel takes on a symbolic meaning. This is a symbol of the hero's romantic dream, and at the same time a rather prosaic thing necessary in everyday life. From here arises the relativity of all values, which, together with the author's irony, helps to overcome the romantic dual world.

Short stories of 1819-1821: "Little Tsakhes", "Mademoiselle de Scudery", "Corner Window".

Based on the fairy tale novel "Little Tsakhes called Zinnober" (1819) there is a folklore motif: the plot of appropriating the hero's feat to others, appropriating the success of one person to others. The short story is distinguished by complex socio-philosophical issues. The main conflict reflects the contradiction between the mysterious nature and the hostile laws of society. Hoffman opposes personal and mass consciousness, pushing individual and mass man.

Tsakhes is a lower, primitive being, embodying the dark forces of nature, an elemental, unconscious principle that is present in nature. He does not seek to overcome the contradiction between how others perceive him and who he really is: “It was folly to think that the external beautiful gift with which I endowed you, like a ray, would penetrate your soul and awaken a voice that would tell you : "You are not the one for whom you are revered, but strive to be equal to the one on whose wings you, weak, wingless, fly up." But the inner voice did not wake up. Your inert, lifeless spirit could not rise, you did not lag behind stupidity, rudeness, obscenity. The death of the hero is perceived as something equivalent to his essence and his whole life. With the image of Tsakhes, the story includes the problem of alienation, the hero alienates all the best from other people: external data, creativity, love. Thus, the theme of alienation turns into a situation of duality, the loss of inner freedom by the hero.

The only hero who is not subject to fairy magic is Balthazar, a poet in love with Candida. He is the only hero who is endowed with a personal, individual consciousness. Balthazar becomes a symbol of inner, spiritual vision, which everyone around is deprived of. As a reward for exposing Tsakhes, he receives a bride and a wonderful estate. However, the well-being of the hero is shown at the end of the work in an ironic manner.

Novella "Mademoiselle de Scudery"(1820) is one of the earliest examples of a detective story. The plot is based on a dialogue between two personalities: Mademoiselle de Scudery, a French writerXVIIcentury - and Rene Cardillac - the best jeweler in Paris. One of the main problems is the problem of the fate of the creator and his creations. According to Hoffmann, the creator and his art are inseparable from each other, the creator continues in his work, the artist - in his text. The alienation of works of art from the artist is tantamount to his physical and moral death. A thing created by a master cannot be a subject of sale; a living soul dies in a product. Cardillac gets his creations back by killing customers.

Another important theme of the novel is the theme of duality. Everything in the world is dual, Cardillac also leads a double life. His double life reflects the day and night sides of his soul. This duality is already present in the portrait description. The fate of man is also dual. Art, on the one hand, is an ideal model of the world, it embodies the spiritual essence of life and man. On the other hand, in the modern world, art becomes a commodity, and thus it loses its originality, its spiritual meaning. Paris itself, in which the action takes place, turns out to be dual. Paris appears in day and night images. Daytime and nighttime chronotope become a model of the modern world, the fate of the artist and art in this world. Thus, the motif of duality includes the following issues: the very essence of the world, the fate of the artist and art.

Hoffmann's latest short story - "corner window"(1822) - becomes the writer's aesthetic manifesto. The artistic principle of the novel is the principle of the corner window, that is, the depiction of life in its real manifestations. Market life for the hero is a source of inspiration and creativity, it is a way of immersion in life. Hoffmann for the first time poetizes the corporeal world. The principle of the corner window includes the position of the artist-observer who does not interfere with life, but only generalizes it. It communicates to life the features of aesthetic completeness, inner integrity. The short story becomes a kind of model of a creative act, the essence of which is the fixation of the artist's life impressions and the rejection of their unambiguous assessment.

The general evolution of Hoffmann can be represented as a movement from the depiction of the unusual world to the poeticization of everyday life. The type of hero also undergoes changes. The hero-observer comes to replace the hero-enthusiast, the subjective style of the image is replaced by an objective artistic image. Objectivity presupposes that the artist follows the logic of real facts.

Ernst Hoffmann is a German romantic writer, artist, lawyer and composer. He was a very versatile person. During his biography, he managed to create many brilliant works in the field of literature and music.

Music

During the biography of 1807-1808. Hoffman lived in During this time, he made money by tutoring, teaching music lessons.

However, this money was completely lacking even for a meager existence, as a result of which he often experienced serious financial difficulties.

Nevertheless, Hoffmann continued to get involved in art, because he saw only in it. Over time, he discovered his talent as a composer.

Over the course of several years, he wrote many musical works, including the operas Aurora and Ondine, Harlequin and piano sonatas.

In 1808, Hoffmann worked as a theater conductor. After that, he conducted in German theaters.

An interesting fact is that when he was about 30 years old, he changed the name "Wilhelm" to "Amadeus", because he was a great admirer. It is fair to say that he showed himself excellently as a music critic.

Biographers of Hoffmann agree that his literary works are inseparable from music. This is perfectly traced in the short stories - "Cavalier Glitch" and "Kreisleriana".

In 1815, Hoffmann lost his place as a bandmaster, in connection with which he was forced to return to the service that he hated so much. However, working as a lawyer allowed him to be financially independent and left a lot of time for creativity.

Hoffmann's works

During his life, Hoffmann composed dozens of fairy tales, short stories and novels. Many animated and feature films have been shot based on his works. In addition, performances based on the plays of the playwright are staged all over the world.

As a writer, Hoffmann realized himself most of all in the last decade of his biography. The following works brought him the greatest popularity:

• "Elixirs of Satan";
• "Lord of the Fleas";
• "The Life Beliefs of Murr the Cat";
• "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King";
• "Serapion brothers".

Personal life

During his biography, Hoffmann repeatedly fell in love with women. While still a student, he dated a young girl, Dora, for several years. However, he could not propose to her because she was married and had five children.

In 1800, Hoffmann met Michaelina Rorer-Tzhczynska. Young people often talked and found a lot in common. After 2 years, he realized that he was in love with a girl.

For this reason, Hoffmann broke off his engagement to his cousin Minna Derfer in order to marry Michaelina. An interesting fact is that for the sake of his future wife, he converted to Catholicism.

Hoffmann never regretted his decision. He loved unconsciously his wife, who supported him in every possible way and was a reliable support for him.

Death

From 1818, Hoffmann's health began to gradually deteriorate. This was facilitated by problems at work, as well as alcohol abuse. Soon he was diagnosed with a spinal cord disease.

In addition, the writer had strained relations with representatives of the authorities. In his writings, he repeatedly criticized and ridiculed policemen, scammers and spies, who are held in high esteem by the Prussian government.

He even managed to achieve the dismissal of the chief of police, in connection with which he aroused the hatred of the entire police department.

At the beginning of 1822, Hoffmann's health deteriorated sharply. Soon he developed paralysis, which constantly progressed and did not allow him to fully engage in creativity. The day before his death, paralysis reached the composer's neck.

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