Ernst Benjamin Salomo Raupach was born on 21st May 1784 at Straupitz in Silesia, a son of the village pastor. After attending the gymnasium at Liegnitz, he studied theology at the university of Halle. This led to a tutorship in St Petersburg in 1804 and occasionally some preaching in the German Lutheran church. He was also hard at work writing his first dramatic tragedies and in 1817 he gained a professorship in German literature and history.In 1822, after anti-German outbreaks in Russia, he left for Italy and thence to Berlin, where he would remain for the rest of his life. In his career he wrote some 80 plays and other works which greatly influenced life and Culture in the Prussian capital across tragedies, comedies and historical dramas. His seminal early prose vampire story ‘Wake Not the Dead’ was originally published in 1823 in Minerva Magazine. When translated into English it was for many decades wrongly attributed to Johann Ludwig Tieck.Ernst Raupach died in Berlin on 18th March 1852. He was 67.