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Gustaf Filip, Count Creutz

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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Count (1729-1785), Swedish poet, was born in Finland in 1729. After concluding his studies in Abo he received a post in the court of chancery at Stockholm in 1751. Here he met Count Gyllenborg, with whom his name is indissolubly connected. They were closely allied with Fru Nordenflycht, and their works were published in common; to their own generation they seemed equal in fame, but posterity has given the palm of genius to Creutz. His greatest work is contained in the 1762 volume, the idyll of Atis och Camilla; the exquisite little pastoral entitled "Daphne" was published at the same time, and Gyllenborg was the first to proclaim the supremacy of his friend. In 1763 Creutz practically closed his poetical career; he went to Spain as ambassador, and after three years to Paris in the same capacity. In 1783 Gustavus III. recalled him and heaped honours upon him, but he died soon after, on the Both of October 1785. Atis och Camilla was long the most admired poem in the Swedish language; it is written in a spirit of pastoral which is now to some degree faded, but in comparison with most of the other productions of the time it is freshness itself. Creutz introduced a melody and grace into the Swedish tongue which it lacked before, and he has been styled "the last artificer of the language." See Creutz och Gyllenborgs Vitterhetsarbeten (Stockholm, 1795).