Ulrich von Liechtenstein is by far the best-documented author of the high courtly period of medieval German literature. What is known about his life, however, seems not at all compatible with what one learns about him from his work. His main work, the Frauendienst (Service of Women, circa 1255), is the first epic in the German vernacular written in the first person. For that reason many scholars--especially in the nineteenth century--have wanted to see the work as an early forerunner of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Dichtung und Wahrheit (Poetry and Truth, 1811-1813; translated as Memoirs of Goethe, 1824)--that is, as a kind of autobiography treated with a high degree of poetic freedom. Such a comparison has caused much confusion, which is heightened by the clear identification of the "I" in the work with the author's own name as well as by his frequent references to names, places, and events...