Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen

Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen was a German author, best known for his 1669 picaresque novel Simplicius Simplicissimus and the accompanying Simplician Cycle series, which includes The Life of Courage. He was born around 1621 or 1622 and died on 17 August 1676, and his novel is regarded as the first great German adventure novel. He was born at Gelnhausen and at ten was kidnapped by Hessian soldiers, experiencing military life in the Thirty Years' War. He became a regular soldier in 1639, later worked as a writer in a regimental chancellery, and after the war entered the service of the Catholic bishop of Strasbourg.