BRENTANO, KLEMENS (1778-1842), German poet and novelist, was born at Ehrenbreitstein on Sept. 8, 1778. His sister was the well known Bettina von Arnim, the correspondent of Goethe. He studied at Halle and Jena, where he made the acquaintance of the Schlegels, Hardenberg and Tieck, and after wards resided at Heidelberg, Vienna and Berlin. In 1818, weary of his somewhat restless and unsettled life, he joined the Roman Catholic Church and withdrew to the monastery of Dulmen, where he lived for some years in strict seclusion. The latter part of his life he spent in Regensburg, Frankfurt and Munich, actively en gaged in Catholic propaganda. He died at Aschaffenburg on July 28, 1842. Brentano, whose early writings were published under the pseudonym Maria, belonged to the Heidelberg group of German romantic writers, and his works are marked by excess of fantastic imagery and by abrupt, bizarre modes of expression. But although he possessed no great poetic genius, he occupies an important position in the history of German literature. It was with the publication of Des Knaben Wunderhorn (18o5–o8), of which he was joint editor, that the new character of the Romantic movement showed itself. Instead of the vague profundity typical of the first Romantics, we find here the simplicity of the volkslied, a form of lyric which Brentano could imitate most skilfully. A satirical vein was another feature of his work, and appeared in some of his prose writings. Among his first publications were Satiren and poetische Spiele (i800), and a romance Godwi (1801 02) ; of his dramas the best are Ponce de Leon (1804), Victoria (1817) and Die Griindung Prags (1815) . On the whole his finest work is the collection of Romanzen vom Rosenkranz (published posthumously in 1852) ; his short stories, and more especially the charming Geschichte vom braven Kasperl and dem schonen Annerl (1838), which has been translated into English, are still popular.
Brentano's collected works, edited by his brother Christian, appeared at Frankfurt in 9 vols. (1851-55). The best modern issue is the collected works edited by Carl Schiiddekopf (Munich and Leipzig, 1909, etc.). Selections have been edited by J. B. Diel (1873), M. Koch (1892), and J. Dohmke (1893). See J. B. Diel and W. Kreiten, Klemens Brentano (1877-78), the introduction to Koch's edition and R. Steig, A. von Arnim and K. Brentano