EWALD

See also:

• CHRISTIAN
• CHRISTIAN, WILLIAM (1608-1663)

CHRISTIAN VON

See also:

• KLEIST, BERND HEINRICH WILHELM VON (1777-1811)
• EWALD CHRISTIAN VON KLEIST (1715–1759)

KLEIST (1715–1759)  , German poet, was bore] at Zeblin, near Koslin in Pomerania, on the 7th of March 1715 . After attending the Jesuit school in Deutschkrona and the gymnasium in Danzig, he proceeded in 1731 to the university of Konigsberg, where he studied law and mathematics . On the completion of his studies, he entered the Danish army, in which he became an officer in 1736 . Recalled to Prussia by Frederick II. in 1740, he was appointed lieutenant in a regiment stationed at Potsdam, where he became acquainted with J . W . L . Gleim (q.v.), who interested him in poetry . After distinguishing himself at the battle of Mollwitz (April lo, 1741) and the siege of Neisse (1741), he was promoted captain in 1749 and major in r7J6 . Quartered during the winter of 1757–1758 in Leipzig, he found relief from his irksome military duties in the society of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (q.v.) . Shortly afterwards in the battle of Kunersdorf, on the 12th of August 1759, he was mortally wounded while leading the attack, and died at Frankfort-on-Oder on the 24th of August following . Kleist's chief work is a poem in hexameters, Der Fruhling (1749), for which Thomson's Seasons largely supplied ideas . In his description of the beauties of nature Kleist shows real poetical genius, an almost modern sentiment and fine taste ..

He also wrote some charming odes, idylls and elegies, and a small epic poem Cissides and Paches (1759), the subject being two Thessaliaa

friends who die an heroic death for their country in a battle against the Athenians . Kleist published in 1756 the first collection of his Gedichte, which was followed by a second in 1758 . After his death his friend Karl Wilhelm Ramler (q.v.) published an edition of Kleists sdmtliche Werke in 2 vols . (1760) . A critical edition was published by A . Sauer, in 3 vols . (1880-1882) . Cf. further, A . Chuquet, De Ewaldi Kleistii vita et scriptis (Paris, 1887), and H . Prahle, Friedrich der Grosse and die deutsche Literatur (1872) .