Willibald Alexis

Willibald Alexis, the pseudonym of Georg Wilhelm Heinrich Häring (29 June 1798 – 16 December 1871), was a German historical novelist, considered part of the Young Germany movement.

His father, who came of a French refugee family, named Hareng, held a high position in the war department.

He attended the Werdersche Gymnasium in Berlin, and then, serving as a volunteer in the campaign of 1815, took part in the siege of the Ardenne fortresses.

[1] Having made his name first known as a writer by an idyll in hexameters, Die Treibjagd (1820), and several short stories, his literary reputation was first established by the historical novel Walladmor (1823), which was published as being "freely translated from the English of Sir Walter Scott, with a preface by Willibald Alexis".

Soon afterwards, Alexis published a number of successful short stories (Gesammelte Novellen, 4 vols., 1830–1831), some books of travel, and in the novels Das Haus Dusterweg (1835) and Zwölf Nächte (1838) showed for a while a leaning towards the "Young German" school.