 Among Busch 's last works were the stories Clement Dove , the Poet Thwarted ( Balduin Bählamm , der verhinderte Dichter ) ( 1883 ) and Painter Squirtle ( Maler Klecksel ) ( 1884 ) , both of which focus on artistic failure , and indirectly his own failure . Both stories begin with a preface , which , for biographer Joseph Kraus , were bravura pieces of " Komische Lyrik " — German comic poetry . Clement Dove ridicules the bourgeois amateur poet circle of Munich , " The Crocodiles " ( Die Krokodile ) , and their prominent members Emanuel Geibel , Paul von Heyse and Adolf Wilbrandt . Painter Squirtle criticizes the bourgeois art connoisseur , who believes the worth of art is gauged by its price . 
