Wilhelm Hauff

Born in Stuttgart on November 29, 1802, Wilhelm Hauff was a German poet and novelist whose reputation rests especially on his fairy tales. After losing his father as a child, he grew up partly in Tübingen, where he had access to his grandfather's library, and he later studied theology there.

Early in his career he worked as a tutor for the children of a Württemberg official, and he began writing stories for them. Those tales grew into the works that made him famous, including Little Muck, Caliph Stork, and Heart of Stone. He also wrote the historical novel Lichtenstein and the satire The Man in the Moon, showing how easily he could move between fantasy, adventure, and literary parody.

Hauff died in Stuttgart on November 18, 1827, at just 24 years old. Even with such a short life, he left behind a body of work that became a lasting part of German literature, especially through stories that still feel lively, strange, and wonderfully tellable aloud.