Richard Georg Spiller von Hauenschild, better known by his pseudonym

Pseudonym

A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...

 Max Waldau (10 March 1825 – 20 January 1855), was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 and novelist.

Life

Born in Breslau (Wrocław), Prussian Silesia, Waldau lost his father early on in life, was educated in several boarding schools, and started studying law at Breslau University. Later, he took up philosophy, philology, and history at Heidelberg University, where he received a doctorate. Waldau traveled for an extended period of time in Germany, Switzerland, France, Belgium, and Italy, though, after the failed German revolution

Revolutions of 1848 in the German states

The Revolutions of 1848 in the German states, also called the March Revolution – part of the Revolutions of 1848 that broke out in many countries of Europe – were a series of loosely coordinated protests and rebellions in the states of the German Confederation, including the Austrian Empire...

 of 1848-49, he retired to his estate of Tscheidt, near Bauerwitz (Baborów)

Baborów

Baborów is a small town in Poland near Głubczyce, Opole Voivodeship.The first mention of the town comes from 1296 in which a wójt Jarosław is mentioned. The town was most likely founded by a Bohemian magnate, Bavor . Later it was part of an independent principality, the Austro Hungarian Empire,...

, Upper Silesia

Upper Silesia

Upper Silesia is the southeastern part of the historical and geographical region of Silesia. Since the 9th century, Upper Silesia has been part of Greater Moravia, the Duchy of Bohemia, the Piast Kingdom of Poland, again of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown and the Holy Roman Empire, as well as of...

.

Waldau started publishing poetry and prose in 1847; his compositions, while well written, lacked emotion and excitement. But, his friendship with Leopold Schefer

Leopold Schefer

Leopold Schefer , German poet, novelist, and composer, was born in a small town in Upper Lusatia , only child of a poor country doctor.-Biography:...

, an older and more prestigious poet, resulted in Schefer releasing two series of beautiful poems, written in his youth, anonymously to the public; Waldau edited these collections, Hafis in Hellas and Koran der Liebe, in Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

 1853 resp. 1855.

Unexpectedly, Waldau died at the age of 30 at Tscheidt.

Publications

• 1847: Ein Elfenmärchen (fairy tale)
• 1847: Blätter im Winde (poetry)
• 1848: Kanzonen (poetry)
• 1850: Aus der Junkerwelt (novel)
• 1851: Nach der Natur. Lebende Bilder aus der Zeit (prose)
• 1852: Aimiry, der Jongleur (novel)
• 1854: Cordula. Graubündner Sage
• 1855: Rahab
  Rahab
  Rahab, was, according to the Book of Joshua, a woman who lived in Jericho in the Promised Land and assisted the Israelites in capturing the city...
  
  . Frauenbild aus der Bibel

Literature

Waldau's manusripts, papers, and letters at Tscheidt must be considered lost due to acts of war, 1945.

• Franz Pietsch: Max Waldau: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Jungen Deutschland
  Young Germany
  Young Germany was a group of German writers which existed from about 1830 to 1850. It was essentially a youth ideology . Its main proponents were Karl Gutzkow, Heinrich Laube, Theodor Mundt and Ludolf Wienbarg; Heinrich Heine, Ludwig Börne and Georg Büchner were also considered part of the movement...
  
   unter Benutzung ungedruckter handschriftlicher Quellen, Phil. Diss., Breslau 1921 [in German]
• Karl Schumacher: Max Waldau (Richard Georg von Hauenschild): Leben, Werke und Schicksal eines deutschen Dichters; unter Benutzung des Nachlasses und bisher nicht bearbeiteter Quellen, Germanische Studien, vol. 38, Ebering, Berlin 1925 [in German]