A Hero's Life, TrV 190

Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life), Op. 40 is a tone poem by Richard Strauss. The work was completed in 1898. It was his sixth work in the genre, and exceeded any of its predecessors in its orchestral demands. Generally agreed to be autobiographical in nature, despite contradictory statements on the matter by the composer, the work contains more than thirty quotations from Strauss's earlier works, including Also sprach Zarathustra, Till Eulenspiegel, and Death and Transfiguration.