Hoffmann, Ernst Theodor Amadeus, 1776-1822, German romantic novelist and composer, a lawyer. At one time an opera composer and musical director at Bamberg and a gifted music critic, he is most famous as a master of the gothic tale. His stories of madness, grotesquerie, horror, and the supernatural include Fantasiestücke in Callots Manier (1814-15), Die Serapionsbrüder (1819-21, tr. The Serapion Brethren, 1886-92), Die Elixiere des Teufels (1815-16, tr. The Devil's Elixir, 1824-26), and Lebensansichten des Katers Murr (1820-22, tr. Kater Murr, the Educated Cat, 1892). Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker (1892) and Offenbach's opera Les Contes d'Hoffmann (1881) [the Tales of Hoffmann] are based on his stories. His writings greatly influenced the composer Schumann.