Dichtung und Wahrheit

Aus meinem Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit (From my Life: Poetry and Truth; 1811–1833) is an autobiography by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe that comprises the time from the poet's childhood to the days in 1775, when he was about to leave for Weimar.

[2] Goethe asked Bettina von Arnim to send him the notes that she had written down about his youth on the basis of meetings she had had with his mother out of a related interest.

[1] As far as art is concerned, the word Dichtung (meaning both poetry and fiction) is deliberately ambiguous, indicating that the author has systematically selected those events which he considered it desirable to mention.

In spite of important experiences, part four does not open a new phase in Goethe's development, but it does bring the outer course of his life to its most decisive turning point — his departure from Weimar.

Dichtung und Wahrheit also mirrors Goethe's development as a poet and partly expounds the changes in the author's thinking that were brought about by the Seven Years' War and the French occupation, while other experiences throughout are presented and colored.