CHAMISSO, ADELBERT VON (Loves CHARLES AD ELAIDE DE) (1781-1838), German poet and botanist, was born at the château of Boncourt in Champagne, the ancestral seat of his family. Driven from France by the revolution, his parents settled in Berlin, where in 1796 young Chamisso obtained the post of page-in-waiting to the queen, and in entered a Prussian in fantry regiment as ensign. In close collaboration with Varn hagen von Ense, he founded in 1803 the Berliner Musenalmanach, in which his first verses appeared. Although the enterprise was a failure, it brought him to the notice of literary celebrities. He left the army in 1808, and in 1810 joined the charmed circle of Mme. de Stael, following her in her exile to Coppet in Switzer land. In 1813 he wrote the prose narrative Peter Schlemihl, the man who sold his shadow. The most famous of all his works, it has been translated into most European languages (English by W. Howitt). In 1815 Chamisso was appointed botanist to the Russian ship "Rurik," which Otto von Kotzebue commanded on a scientific voyage round the world. He published his diary (Tagebuch) of this expedition in 1821. In 1818 he became cus todian of the botanical gardens in Berlin. From 1829 he brought out the Deutsche Musenalmanach, in which his later poems were mainly published. He died on Aug. 21, 1838.
As a scientist Chamisso wrote Bemerkungen and Ansichten, and tf bersicht der nutzbarsten and schadlichsten Gewcichse in Norddeutschland (1829). His Frauenliebe and -leben (1830), a cycle of lyrical poems, which was set to music by Schumann, were particularly famous. Noteworthy are also Schloss Boncourt and Salas y Gomez. In the lyrical expression of the domestic emotions he displays a fine felicity, and he knew how to treat with true feeling a tale of love or vengeance. Die Lowenbraut may be taken as a sample of his weird and powerful simplicity; and Vergeltung is remarkable for a pitiless precision of treatment.
The first collected edition of Chamisso's works was edited by J. E. Hitzig (6 vols., 1836; 6th ed., 1874) ; there are also excellent editions by M. Koch (1883) and 0. F. Walzel (1892). On Chamisso's life see J. E. Hitzig, "Leben and Briefe von Adelbert von Chamisso" (in the Gesammelte Werke) ; K. Fulda, Chamisso and seine Zeit (1880 ; G. Hofmeister, Adelbert von Chamisso (5884) ; and E. du Adelbert von Chamisso als Naturforscher (1889) .