Background
He was born in Hildesheim, the oldest child of Kammerherr Börries von Münchhausen and his wife, Clementine von der Gabelentz.
He was born in Hildesheim, the oldest child of Kammerherr Börries von Münchhausen and his wife, Clementine von der Gabelentz.
He studied law and political science at the universities of Heidelberg, Munich, Göttingen, and Berlin.
At 13, he was sent to Ilfeld to the monastery school. He received his degree from the University of Leipzig. While he was still a student, he composed a number of ballads and published his first collection of poetry in 1898, which expressed adherence to German Romantic poets" fascination with the Middle Ages and the world of German legend.
After World War I, his popularity quickly waned.
The motto of the academy was to be "German, Christian, and above all conscious of tradition."
This was von Münchhausen"s chance, and he signed the Gelöbnis treuester Gefolgschaft, the vow of fidelity to Adolf Hitler. Von Münchhausen agreed with Hitler"s Machtpolitik and worked hard to make the Prussian Academy into a German Academy.
However, these efforts came to naught despite Hermann Göring"s support. As the Allied troops approached his estate of Windischleuba, von Münchhausen took an overdose of sleeping pills.
His position became more and more reactionary with the founding of the Deutsche Dichterakademie, with its seat on the Wartburg, which belonged to von Münchhausen"s cousin Hans von der Gabelentz.
With Hitler"s rise to power, many of the members of the Prussian Academy in Berlin were either dismissed or resigned.