Eichendorff, Joseph, Baron von

Eichendorff, Joseph, Baron von

(born , March 10, 1788, near Ratibor, Prussia—died Nov. 26, 1857, Neisse) German poet and novelist. Born to the nobility, he and his family lost their castle in the Napoleonic Wars, and he later worked in the Prussian civil service. He became associated with the national leaders of the Romantic movement while studying in Berlin. His most important prose work, Memoirs of a Good-for-Nothing (1826), is considered a high point of Romantic fiction. In the 1830s he wrote poetry that achieved the popularity of folk songs and inspired such composers as Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn, Johannes Brahms, Hugo Wolf, and Richard Strauss.