Hoffmann, E. T. A. (1776 - 1822) | Literary World (Review Date 4 April 1885)
LITERARY WORLD (REVIEW DATE 4 APRIL 1885)
SOURCE: "Hoffmann's Weird Tales." Literary World 16, no. 7 (4 April 1885): 111-12.
In the following excerpt from a review of Serapionsbrüder (The Serapion Brethren), the critic maintains that Hoffmann's collection is without literary merit and is worthwhile only as an object of morbid curiosity.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR SIR WALTER SCOTT ON HOFFMANN'S TALENT AND MENTAL STATE
The author who led the way in [the Fantastic style] of literature was Ernest Theodore William Hoffmann; the peculiarity of whose genius, temper, and habits, fitted him to distinguish himself where imagination was to be strained to the pitch of oddity and bizarrerie. He appears to have been a man of rare talent,—a poet, an artist, and a musician, but unhappily of a hypochondriac and whimsical disposition, which carried him to extremes in all his...
[The entire page is 868 words long]
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