TIECK, JOHANN LUDWIG (1773-1853), German poet, novelist and critic, was born in Berlin on May 31, 1773, his father being a rope-maker. He was educated at the Friedrich-Werdersche Gymnasium, and at the universities of Halle, GOttingen and Erlangen. At GOttingen Shakespeare and the Elizabethan drama were the chief subjects of his study. In 1794 he returned to Berlin, resolved to make a living by his pen. He contributed a number of short stories (1795-1798) to the series of Strauss federn, published by the bookseller C. F. Nicolai and originally edited by J. K. A. Musaus, and wrote Abdallah (1796) and a novel in letters, William Lovell (3 vols. 1795-1796). Tieck's transition to romanticism is to be seen in the series of plays and stories published under the title V olksmarchen von Peter Lebrecht (3 vols., 1797), a collection which contains the admirable fairy tale Der blonde Eckbert, and the witty dramatic satire on Berlin literary taste, Der gestiefelte Kater. With his school and college friend W. H. Wackenroder (1773-1798), he planned the novel Franz Sternbalds Wanderungen (vols. i.--ii. 1798) , which was the first expression of the romantic enthusiasm for old German art.
In 18o1 Tieck went to Dresden, then lived for a time near Frankfort-on-the-Oder, and spent many months in Italy. In 1803 he published a translation of Minnelieder aus der schwdbischen Vorzeit, between 1799 and 1804 an excellent version of Don Quixote, and in 1811 two volumes of Elizabethan dramas, Alten glisches Theater. The stories Der Runenberg, Die Elfen, Der Pokal, and the dramatic fairy tale, Fortunat, with earlier works, appeared in the collection Phantasm (3 vols., 1812-17). In 1817 Tieck visited England in order to collect materials for a work on Shakespeare (unfortunately never finished) and in 1819 he settled permanently in Dresden; from 1825 on he was literary adviser to the Court Theatre, and his semi-public readings from the dramatic poets gave him a reputation which extended far beyond the Saxon capital. The new series of short stories which he began to publish in 1822 also won him a wide popularity.
Notable among these are Die Gemdlde, Die Reisenden, Die Verlobung, Des Lebens tJberfluss. More ambitious and on a wider canvas are the historical or semi-historical novels, Dichter leben (1826), Der Aufruhr in den Cevennen (1826, unfinished), Der Tod des Dichters (1834) , Der junge Tischlermeister (1836; but begun in 1811), an excellent story written under the in fluence of Goethe's Wilhelm Meister. Vittoria Accorombona (1840), in the style of the French Romanticists, shows a falling off. In later years Tieck carried on a varied literary activity as critic (Dramaturgische Bliitter, 2 vols., 1825-1826; Kritische Schriften, 2 vols., 1848) ; he also edited the translation of Shake speare by A. W. Schlegel, who was assisted by Tieck's daughter Dorothea (1799-1841) and by Graf Wolf Heinrich Baudissin (1789-1878) ; Shakespeares Vorschule (2 vols., 1823-1829) ; the works of H. von Kleist (1826) and of J. M. R. Lenz (1828). In 1841 Friedrich Wilhelm IV. of Prussia invited him to Berlin where he enjoyed a pension for his remaining years. He died on April 28, 1853.