In all of Hoffmann's stories there is some unpleasant, bizarre
character; this is the author's satire on his own strange personality.
There is none of Poe's objectivity in Hoffmann, but he uses his
subjectivity in a peculiarly Romantic fashion. It is his idea to raise
the reader above the every-day point of view, to flee from this to
a magic world where the unusual shall take the place of the real and
where wonder shall rule. So there are in Hoffmann's stories a series
of characters who are really doubles. To the uninitiated they seem
every-day creatures; to those who know, they are fairies or beings
from the supernatural world. Such characters are found at their best
in _The Golden Pot_.
Hoffmann has influenced both French and English literatures more than
any other Romantic poet. Hawthorne and Poe read him, and he was felt
by the French to be one of the first Germans whom they understood. It
was not merely that his clear reason appealed to the French, but that
they saw in him one endowed as with a sixth sense. He has a fineness
of observation, especially for the ridiculous sides of humanity,
together with a tenderness of spirit, that was new in German
literature as such men as Sainte-Beuve and Gautier saw it. The soul
at war with itself, uncovering its most secret thoughts, the _"malheur
d'etre poete,"_ coupled with wit, taste, gaiety, and the comedy
spirit--all these the French found in Hoffmann as in no other German.
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