| Johann Wolfgang von Goethe | |||||||||||
| 約翰·沃爾夫岡·馮·歌德 | |||||||||||
閱讀歌德 Goethe在小说之家的作品!!! 閱讀歌德 Goethe在诗海的作品!!! | |||||||||||
歌德歌德1749年8月28日出生於法蘭剋福鎮的一個富裕的市民家庭，曾先後在萊比錫大學和斯特拉斯堡大學學習法律，也曾短時期當過律師。他年輕時曾經夢想成為畫傢，在繪畫的同時他也開始了文學創作。但是在他看到意大利著名畫傢的作品時，他覺得自己無論如何努力都不可能與那些大師相提並論，於是開始專註於文學創作。1775--1786年他為改良現實社會，應聘到魏瑪公國做官，但一事無成。1786年6月他前往意大利，專心研究自然科學，從事繪畫和文學創作。1788年回到魏瑪後任劇院監督。
歌德是德國狂飆突進運動的主將。他的作品充滿了狂飆突進運動的反叛精神，在詩歌、戲劇、散文等方面都有較高的成就，主要作品有劇本《葛茲·馮·伯裏欣根》、中篇小說《少年維特的煩惱》、未完成的詩劇《普羅米修斯》和詩劇《浮士德》的雛形《原浮士德》，此外還寫了許多抒情詩和評論文章。
《葛茲·馮·伯裏欣根》是德國第一部現實主義歷史劇。葛茲原是16世紀德國的一個沒落騎士，他曾一度參加農民起義， 後來背叛了農民。葛茲作為一個騎士、作為一個垂死階級的代表，起來反對現存制度的行動，是騎士階級對皇帝和封建領主的悲劇性的對抗。但是，在歌德的筆下，葛茲被寫成一個反對封建暴政、爭取自由和統一的英雄，他深切的同情人民的苦難，斥責爭取權利、禍國殃民的諸侯，因而受到人民的愛戴。劇中對於當時黑暗社會的譴責，對於自由和統一的熱烈嚮往，對於個人反抗的英雄的歌頌，都表現了狂飆突進運動的精神。在藝術上，劇中采用了莎士比亞戲劇創作的方法。
《少年維特的煩惱》是一部書信體小說。主人公維特是一個出身市民的青年，他嚮往自由、平等的生活，希望從事有益的實際工作 。但是，圍繞他的社會卻充滿着等級的偏見和鄙陋的習氣。保守腐敗的官場，庸俗屈從的市民，趨勢傲慢的貴族使他和周圍的現實不斷發生衝突，他自己又陷入毫無希望的愛情之中，最後走上了自殺的道路。維特與社會的衝突 , 具有反封建的意義 ，通過維特的悲劇，小說揭露和批判了當時德國社會許多不合理的現實，表達了覺醒的德國青年一代的革命情緒，因此，它一發表就引起了強烈的反響，形成了一陣維特熱，而且很快就流傳到歐洲各國，成為第一部發生重大國際影響的各國文學作品。作品講述的是24歲的歌德因公去維茲拉，在出席一次舞會的途中、偶然認識了一個叫夏緑蒂的少女，一見鐘情。夏緑蒂是歌德的朋友凱士特南的未婚妻，時年15歲，而凱士特南卻31歲。歌德對夏緑蒂十分傾倒，便不顧一切地嚮她表白了愛情。這使夏緑蒂驚惶失措，她把歌德的表白告訴了未婚夫，凱士特南對此表現的無所謂。歌德知道這個情況，感到十分震驚，為了自己，也為了夏緑蒂，他立即逃回法蘭剋福，斬斷了這不合適的情絲。幾個月以後，他的另一個朋友葉爾查林，因為愛上別人的妻子，受不了社會輿論的指責自殺了。歌德知道這件事後，感觸很深，使用葉爾查林作原型寫了小說《少年維特之煩惱》。這部小說，使他名噪一時。
《高爾基名言》是歌德取材於古代希臘神話的一部詩劇，劇本雖然沒有寫完，但流傳下來的片段已表達出歌德年輕時代的強烈的反封建精神。劇中的普羅米修斯否認宙斯的權利，反對宙斯的專橫跋扈，並且要創造和他一樣蔑視宙斯的新的人類。維特身上所缺乏的那種堅韌的性格，在這個神話人物身上得到了體現。
歌德在魏瑪市的最初十年，歌德埋頭事務，很少創作。到意大利後，他陸續完成了早已開始的一些作品，寫出了《在陶裏斯的伊菲格尼亞》和《哀格蒙特》等作品，也寫了《塔索》和《浮士德》部分章節。
劇本《哀格蒙特》取材於16世紀尼德蘭人民反抗西班牙的鬥爭歷史。哀格蒙特在歷史上是一個動搖不定的貴族反對派，歌德把他寫成一個為民族的自由和統一而鬥爭的、受到人民愛戴的英雄。但是他缺乏積極的行動，主張采取溫和的手段，最後被處死。劇中仍然保留着狂飆突進運動的革命情緒，但人物的反抗精神已經降低。
《在陶裏斯的伊菲格尼亞》取材於希臘神話，主人公伊菲格尼亞身處異國，卻能以完美的品行、博愛的胸懷感動國王，改變了那裏野蠻的風俗，建立人道和公正的準則。
歌德晚年的創作極其豐富 ，重要的如自傳性作品 《詩與真》、《意大利遊記》、長篇小說《親和力》和《威廉·麥斯特的漫遊時代》，抒情詩集《西方和東方的合集》，逝世前不久，又完成了《浮士德》第二部。這些作品表現了歌德重視實踐、肯定為人類幸福而勞動的思想，說明他思想中的積極因素比前一時期有所增長。
《浮士德》是歌德的一部代表作，他寫這部巨著，前後曾用了60年之久。《浮士德》的第一部完成於1808年法軍入侵的時候，第二部則完成於1831年8月31日，是時他已83歲高齡。這部不朽的詩劇。以德國民間傳說為題材，以文藝復興以來的德國和歐洲社會為背景，寫一個新興資産階級先進知識分子不滿現實，竭力探索人生意義和社會理想的生活道路。是一部現實主義和浪漫主義結合得十分完好的詩劇。
《威廉·麥斯特的漫遊時代》雖然不如《威廉·麥斯特的學習時代》那樣引人，然而它以探求理想的社會制度為中心，認為人們衹有在為集體福利而積極勞動中才能獲得人生的意義，思想比較開闊、積極。歌德晚年的許多抒情詩中閃爍着唯物主義、樂觀主義思想的光芒，在當時消極浪漫主義文學風行一時的德國文壇上獨放異彩。《浮士德》第二部的完成尤其突出的表現了歌德晚年思想上和藝術上的新發展。
1832年3月22日，歌德病逝。歌德是德國民族文學的最傑出的代表，他的創作把德國文學提高到全歐的先進水平，並對歐洲文學的發展作出了巨大的貢獻。
英文介紹
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German polymath. Goethe's works span the fields of poetry, drama, literature, theology, Humanism, science, and painting. His most enduring work, the two-part dramatic poem Faust, is considered one of the peaks of world literature. Goethe's other well-known literary works include his numerous poems, the Bildungsroman Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, the epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther and the semi-autobiographical novel Elective Affinities.
歌德名言，警句，格言，語錄
· 任何人都不笨但如果你不利用你的大腦你會發覺你很笨!
· 誰是最幸福的人？乃是能感到他人的功績、視他人之樂如自己之樂的人。
· 最大的幸福在於我們的缺點得到糾正，我們的錯誤得到補救。
· 能把自己生命的終點和起點聯結起來的人，是最幸福的人。
· 在蠢人感到人生睏難的時候，賢人看起來容易；而當蠢人感到容易的時候，賢者就感到睏難。
· 人生一世不就是為了化短暫的事物為永久的嗎？要做到這一步，就須懂得如何珍視這短暫和永久。
· 雖然人人都企求得很多，但所需要的卻是微乎其微。因為人生是短暫的，人的命運是有限的。
· 凡不是就着淚水吃過面包的人是不懂得人生之味的人。
· 生活也好，自由也好，都要天天去贏取，這纔有資格去享有它。
· 衹有這樣的人才配生活和自由，假如他每天為之而奮鬥。
· 一個人衹要宣稱自己是自由的，就會同時感到他是受限製的。如果你敢於宣稱自己是受限製的，你就會感到自己是自由的。
· 對別人述說自己，這是一種天性；因此，認真對待別人嚮你述說他自己的事，這是一種教養。
· 真正的志同道合者不可能長久地爭吵；他們總會重新言好的。
· 衹要你告訴我，你交的是些什麽樣的人，我就能說出，你是什麽人。
· 友誼衹能在實踐中産生並在實踐中得到保持。
· 知道危險而不說的人，是敵人。
· 人應該有愛好真理，一見真理就采納它那樣的心靈。
· 錯誤同真理的關係，就像睡夢同清醒的關係一樣。一個人從錯誤中醒來，就會以新的力量走嚮真理。
· 鬥爭是掌握本領的學校，挫折是通嚮真理的橋梁。
· 對真理的熱愛就體現在：知道怎樣去發現和珍惜每一件事物的好處。
· 我們對於真理必須經常反復地說，因為錯誤也有人在反復地宣傳，並且不是個別的人而是有大批的人宣傳。
· 關鍵在於要有一顆愛真理的心靈，隨時隨地地碰見真理，就把它吸收進來。
· 把前人獲得的零星的真理找出來進一步加以發展，就是當之無愧理應受到奬賞的功勞。
· 聰明的年輕人以為，如果承認已經被別人承認過的真理，就會使自己喪失獨創性，這是極大的錯誤。
· 真理是一隻火炬，而且是一支極大的火炬，所以當我們懷着生怕被它燒着的恐懼心情企圖從它旁邊走過去的時候，連眼睛也難以睜開。
· 看出錯誤比發現真理要容易得多；因為謬誤是在明處，也是可以剋服的；而真理則藏在深處，並且不是任何人都能發現它。
· 誰接受純粹的經驗並且按照它去行動，誰就有足夠的真理。
· 知識的歷史猶如一隻偉大的復音麯，在這衹麯子裏依依次響起各民族的聲音。
· 世界上有許多既美好又出類拔萃的事物，可是他們卻各不相依。
· 我們雖可以靠父母和親戚的庇護而成長，倚賴兄弟和好友，藉交遊的扶助，因愛人而得到幸福，但是無論怎樣，歸根結底人類還是依賴自己。
· 我的遺産多麽壯麗、廣阔、遼遠！時間是我的財産，我的田畝是時間。
· 把時間用得節省些，我很可能把最珍貴的金剛石拿到手。
· 今天做不成的，明天也不會做好。一天也不能虛度，要下决心把可能的事情，一把抓住而緊緊抱住，有决心就不會任其逃去，而且必然要貫徹實行。
· 一個鐘頭有六十分鐘，一天就超過了一千分鐘。明白這個道理後，就知道人可作出多少貢獻。
· 誰若遊戲人生，他就一世無成，誰不能主宰自己，永遠是一個奴隸。
· 正當利用時間！你要理解什麽，不要捨近求遠。
· 衹要我們能善用時間,就永遠不愁時間不夠用。
· 要做一番偉大的事業，總得在青年時代開始。
· 事業最要緊，名譽是空言。
· 一個人無論往哪裏走，無論從事什麽事業，他終將回到本性指給的路上。
· 事業是一切，名號衹是虛聲。
· 勞動可以使我們擺脫三大災禍：寂寞、惡習、貧睏。
· 你若要為你的意義而歡喜，就必須給這個世界以意義。
· 凡是自強不息者，最終都會成功。
· 一個人不能騎兩匹馬，騎上這匹，就要丟掉那匹。聰明人會把凡是分散精力的要求置之度外，衹專心緻志地去學一門，學一門就要把它學好。
· 幻想是詩人的翅膀，假設是科學家的天梯。
· 就科學來講，把前人獲得的零星的真理找出來進一步加以發展，就是當之無愧理應受到奬賞的功勞。
· 在今天和明天之間，有一段很長的時間；趁你還有精神的時候，學習迅速地辦事。
· 人不光是靠他生來就擁有一切，而是靠他從學習中所得到的一切來造就自己。
· 經驗豐富的人讀書用兩衹眼睛，一隻眼睛看到紙面上的話，另一眼睛看到紙的背面。
· 誰有用腦子去思考，到頭來他除了感覺之外將一無所有。
· 當一個偉大的思想作為一種福音降臨這個世界時，它對於受陳規陋習羈絆的大衆會成為一種冒犯，而在那些讀書不少但學識不深的人看來，卻是一樁蠢事。
· 並非語言本身有多麽正確，有力，或者優美，而在於它所體現出來的思想的力量。
· 我們的生活就像旅行，思想是導遊者，沒有導遊者，一切都會停止。目標會喪失，力量也會化為烏有。
· 異端是生活的詩歌，因此有異端思想是無傷於一個詩人的。
· 我們比較容易承認行為上的錯誤、過失和缺點，而對於思想上的錯誤、過失和缺點則不然。
· 就婦女在其它方面的才能來說，我倒是經常發現婦女一結婚，才能就完蛋了。
· 世上最艱難的工作是什麽？思想。凡是值得思想的事情，沒有不是人思考過的；我們必須做的衹是試圖重新加以思考而已。
· 我這一生基本上衹是辛苦工作，我可以說，我活了七十五歲，沒有哪一個月過的是真正舒服生活，就好像一塊石頭上山，石頭不停地滾下來又推上去。
· 藝術傢對於自然有着雙重關係，他既是自然的主宰，又是自然的奴隸，他是自然的奴隸，因為他必須用人世間的材料進行工作，才能使人理解；同時他又是自然的主宰，因為他使這種人世間的材料服從他的較高的意旨，並且為這較高的意旨服務。
· 一個有真正天才能的人卻在工作過程中感到最高度的快樂。
· 沒有一種禮貌會在外表上叫人一眼就看出教養的不足，正確的教育在於使外表上的彬彬有禮和人的高尚的教養同時表現出來。
· 才能可以在獨處中培養，品格最好還是在世界上的洶涌波濤中形成。
· 甘居下位不算美德；能往下降才是美德，承認低於我們的事物高於我們，也是一種美德。
· 慷慨，尤其是還有謙虛，就會使人贏得好感。
· 許多思想是從一定的文化修養上産生出來的，就如同幼芽是長在緑枝上一樣。
· 一個人應當有良好的禮貌來突出他特有的天性。人人都喜歡出人頭地，但這不應當引起別人的討厭。
· 一個人的禮貌，就是一面照出他的肖像的鏡子。
· 接受忠告，就是增進一個人自己的能力。
· 虔誠不是目的，而是手段，是通過靈魂的最純潔的寧靜而達到最高修養手段。
· 存在着一種出自內心的禮貌。它是變換了形式的愛心。由此産生出一種外部表現出來的最適宜的禮貌。
· 智慧最後的結論是：生活也好，自由也好，都要天天去贏取，這纔有資格去享有它。
· 所謂真正的智慧，都是曾經被人思考過千百次；但要想使它們真正成為我們自己的，一定要經過我閃自己再三思維，直至它們在我個人經驗中生根為止。
· 智慧衹能在真理中發現。
· 什麽是最好的政府？就是指導我們自己去治理自己的政府。
· 誰若遊戲人生，他就一事無成；誰不能主宰自己，便永遠是一個奴隸。
· 智者和愚人都沒有害，最危險的倒是智愚參半。
· 一個傑出人物受到一夥傻瓜的賞識，是可怕的事。
· 如果一個聰明人幹了一件蠢事，那就不會是一件小小的蠢事。
· 蠢人總是提出千百年前的聰明人已經回答了的問題。
· 身體對創造力至少有極大的影響。過去有過一個時期，在德國人們常把天才想象為一個矮小瘦弱的駝子。但是我寧願看到一個身體健壯的天才。
· 十全十美是上天的尺度，而要達到十全十美的這種願望，則是人類的尺度。
· 我不應把我的作品全歸功於自己的智慧，還應歸功於我以外嚮我提供素材的成千成萬的事情和人物。
· 經驗豐富的人讀書用兩衹眼睛，一隻眼睛看到紙面上的話，另一隻眼睛看到紙的背面。
· 讀一本好書，就是和許多高尚的人談話。
· 决定一個人的一生，以及整個命運的，衹是一瞬之間。
· 天才所要求的最先和最後的東西都是對真理的熱愛。
· 如果是玫瑰，它總會開花的。
· 我們全都要從前輩和同輩學習到一些東西。就連最大的天才，如果想單憑他所特有的內在自我去對付一切，他也决不會有多大成就。
· 一個有真正大才能的人卻在工作過程中感到最高度的快樂。
· 我的産業是這樣美，這樣廣，這樣寬，時間是我的財産，我的田地是時間。
· 善於利用時間的人，永遠找得到充裕的時間。
· 我們對於真理必須經常反復地說，因為錯誤也有人在反復地宣傳，並且不是有個別的人而是有大批的人宣傳。
· 人們還往往把真理和錯誤混在一起去教人，而堅持的卻是錯誤。
· 關鍵在於要有一顆愛真理的心靈，隨時隨地碰見真理，就把它吸收進來。
· 誰要遊戲人生，他就一事無成，誰不能主宰自己，永遠是一個奴隸。
· 我們為祖國服務，也不能都采用同一方式，每個人應該按照資稟，各盡所能。
· 你若要喜愛你自己的價值，你就得給世界創造價值。
· 在今天和明天之間，有一段很長的時間；趁你還有精神的時候，學習迅速辦事。
Goethe was one of the key figures of German literature and the movement of Weimar Classicism in the late 18th and early 19th centuries; this movement coincides with Enlightenment, Sentimentality (Empfindsamkeit), Sturm und Drang, and Romanticism. The author of the scientific text Theory of Colours, he influenced Darwin with his focus on plant morphology. He also long served as the Privy Councilor ("Geheimrat") of the duchy of Weimar.
Goethe is the originator of the concept of Weltliteratur ("world literature"), having taken great interest in the literatures of England, France, Italy, classical Greece, Persia, Arabic literature, amongst others. His influence on German philosophy is virtually immeasurable, having major impact especially on the generation of Hegel and Schelling, although Goethe himself expressly and decidedly refrained from practicing philosophy in the rarefied sense.
Goethe's influence spread across Europe, and for the next century his works were a major source of inspiration in music, drama, poetry and philosophy. Goethe is considered by many to be the most important writer in the German language and one of the most important thinkers in Western culture as well. Early in his career, however, he wondered whether painting might not be his true vocation; late in his life, he expressed the expectation that he would ultimately be remembered above all for his work in optics.
Early life
Goethe's birthplace in Frankfurt, Germany (Großer Hirschgraben)Goethe's father, Johann Caspar Goethe (Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 29 July 1710 – Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 25 May 1782), lived with his family in a large house in Frankfurt am Main, then an Imperial Free City of the Holy Roman Empire. Goethe's mother, Catharina Elisabeth Textor (Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 19 February 1731 – Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 15 September 1808), the daughter of the Mayor of Frankfurt Johann Wolfgang Textor (Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 11 December 1693 – Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 6 February 1771) and wife (married at Wetzlar, 2 February 1726) Anna Margaretha Lindheimer (Wetzlar, 23 July 1711 – Frankfurt-am-Main, Hessen, 18 April 1783, a descendant of Lucas Cranach the Elder and Henry III, Landgrave of Hesse-Marburg), married 38-year-old Johann Caspar when she was only 17 at Frankfurt am Main on 20 August 1748. All their children, except for Goethe and his sister, Cornelia Friederike Christiana, who was born in 1750, died at an early age.
Johann Caspar and private tutors gave Goethe lessons in all the common subjects of that time, especially languages (Latin, Greek, French and English). Goethe also received lessons in dancing, riding and fencing. Johann Caspar was the type of father who, feeling frustrated in his own ambitions by what he saw as a deficiency of educational advantages, was determined that his children would have all those advantages which he had not had. Goethe had a persistent dislike of the church, characterizing its history as a "hotchpotch of mistakes and violence" (Mischmasch von Irrtum und Gewalt). His great passion was drawing. Goethe quickly became interested in literature; Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock and Homer were among his early favourites. He had a lively devotion to theatre as well and was greatly fascinated by puppet shows that were annually arranged in his home; a familiar theme in Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship.
Legal career
Goethe studied law in Leipzig from 1765 to 1768. Learning age-old judicial rules by heart was something he strongly detested. He preferred to attend the poetry lessons of Christian Fürchtegott Gellert. In Leipzig, Goethe fell in love with Käthchen Schönkopf and wrote cheerful verses about her in the Rococo genre. In 1770, he anonymously released Annette, his first collection of poems. His uncritical admiration for many contemporary poets vanished as he became interested in Lessing and Wieland. Already at this time, Goethe wrote a good deal, but he threw away nearly all of these works, except for the comedy Die Mitschuldigen. The restaurant Auerbachs Keller and its legend of Faust's 1525 barrel ride impressed him so much that Auerbachs Keller became the only real place in his closet drama Faust Part One. Because his studies did not progress, Goethe was forced to return to Frankfurt at the close of August 1768.
In Frankfurt, Goethe became severely ill. During the next year and a half which followed, because of several relapses, the relationship with his father worsened. During convalescence, Goethe was nursed by his mother and sister. Bored in bed, he wrote an impudent crime comedy. In April 1770, his father lost his patience; Goethe left Frankfurt in order to finish his studies in Strasbourg.
In Alsace, Goethe blossomed. No other landscape has he described as affectionately as the warm, wide Rhine area. In Strasbourg, Goethe met Johann Gottfried Herder, who happened to be in town on the occasion of an eye operation. The two became close friends, and crucially to Goethe's intellectual development, it was Herder who kindled his interest in Shakespeare, Ossian and in the notion of Volkspoesie (folk poetry). On a trip to the village Sesenheim, Goethe fell in love with Friederike Brion, but, after a couple of weeks, terminated the relationship. Several of his poems, like Willkommen und Abschied, Sesenheimer Lieder and Heideröslein, originate from this time.
Despite being based on his own ideas, his legal thesis was published uncensored. Shortly after, he was offered a career in the French government. Goethe rejected it; he did not want to commit himself, but to instead remain an "original genius".
At the end of August 1771, Goethe was certified as a licensee in Frankfurt. He wanted to make the jurisdiction progressively more humane. In his first cases, he proceeded too vigorously, was reprimanded and lost the position. This prematurely terminated his career as a lawyer after only a few months. At this time, Goethe was acquainted with the court of Darmstadt, where his inventiveness was praised. From this milieu came Johann Georg Schlosser (who was later to become his brother-in-law) and Johann Heinrich Merck. Goethe also pursued literary plans again; this time, his father did not have anything against it, and even helped. Goethe obtained a copy of the biography of a noble highwayman from the Peasants' War. In a couple of weeks the biography was reworked into a colourful drama. Entitled Götz von Berlichingen, the work went directly to the heart of Goethe's contemporaries.
Goethe. Painting by Luise Seidler (Weimar 1811)Goethe could not subsist on being one of the editors of a literary periodical (published by Schlosser and Merck). In May 1772 he once more began the practice of law at Wetzlar. In 1774 Goethe wrote the book which would bring him world-wide fame, The Sorrows of Young Werther. Despite the immense success of Werther, it did not bring Goethe much financial gain — copyright law at the time being essentially nonexistent. (In later years Goethe would bypass this problem by periodically authorizing "new, revised" editions of his Complete Works.)
Early years in Weimar
In 1775 Goethe was invited, on the strength of his fame as the author of The Sorrows of Young Werther, to the court of Carl August, Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach. (The Duke at the time was 18 years of age, to Goethe's 26.) Goethe thus went to live in Weimar where he remained throughout the rest of his life, and where, over the course of many years, he held a succession of offices; becoming the Duke's chief adviser.
Goethe, aside from official duties, was also a friend and confidant to the Duke, and participated fully in the activities of the court. For Goethe, his first ten years at Weimar could well be described as a garnering of a degree and range of experience which perhaps could be achieved in no other way. Goethe was ennobled in 1782 (this being indicated by the "von" in his name).
Italy
Goethe's journey to the Italian peninsula from 1786 to 1788 was of great significance in his æsthetical and philosophical development. His father had made a similar journey during his own youth, and his example was a major motivating factor for Goethe to make the trip. More importantly, however, the work of Johann Joachim Winckelmann had provoked a general renewed interest in the classical art of ancient Greece and Rome. Thus Goethe's journey had something of the nature of a pilgrimage to it. During the course of his trip Goethe met and befriended the artists Angelica Kauffmann and Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, as well as encountering such notable characters as Lady Hamilton and Alessandro Cagliostro (see Affair of the Diamond Necklace).
He also journeyed to Sicily during this time, and wrote intriguingly that "To have seen Italy without having seen Sicily is to not have seen Italy at all, for Sicily is the clue to everything." While in Sicily, Goethe encountered, for the first time genuine Greek (as opposed to Roman) architecture, and was quite startled by its relative simplicity. Winckelmann had not recognized the distinctness of the two styles.
Goethe's diaries of this period form the basis of the non-fiction Italian Journey. Italian Journey only covers the first year of Goethe's visit. The remaining year is largely undocumented, aside from the fact that he spent much of it in Venice. This "gap in the record" has been the source of much speculation over the years.
In the decades which immediately followed its publication in 1816 Italian Journey inspired countless German youths to follow Goethe's example. This is pictured, somewhat satirically, in George Elliot's Middlemarch.
Weimar
In late 1792, Goethe took part in the battle of Valmy against revolutionary France, assisting Duke Carl August of Saxe-Weimar during the failed invasion of France. Again during the Siege of Mainz he assisted Carl August as a military observer. His written account of these events can be found within his Complete Works.
In 1794 Friedrich Schiller wrote to Goethe offering friendship; they had previously had only a mutually wary relationship ever since first becoming acquainted in 1788. This collaborative friendship lasted until Schiller's death in 1805.
In 1806, Goethe was living in Weimar with his mistress Christiane Vulpius, the sister of Christian A. Vulpius, and their son Karl August. On October 13, Napoleon's army invaded the town. The French "spoon guards", the least-disciplined soldiers, occupied Goethe's house.
The 'spoon guards' had broken in, they had drunk wine, made a great uproar and called for the master of the house. Goethe's secretary Riemer reports: 'Although already undressed and wearing only his wide nightgown … he descended the stairs towards them and inquired what they wanted from him …. His dignified figure, commanding respect, and his spiritual mien seemed to impress even them.' But it was not to last long. Late at night they burst into his bedroom with drawn bayonets. Goethe was petrified, Christiane raised a lot of noise and even tangled with them, other people who had taken refuge in Goethe's house rushed in, and so the marauders eventually withdrew again. It was Christiane who commanded and organized the defense of the house on the Frauenplan. The barricading of the kitchen and the cellar against the wild pillaging soldiery was her work. Goethe noted in his diary: "Fires, rapine, a frightful night … Preservation of the house through steadfastness and luck." The luck was Goethe's, the steadfastness was displayed by Christiane.
– Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy, Ch. 5
The next day, Goethe legitimized their relationship by marrying Christiane in a quiet marriage service at the court chapel. Christiane Vulpius and Goethe produced a son, Karl August von Goethe (25 December 1789 – 28 October 1830), whose wife, Ottilie von Pogwisch (31 October 1796 – 26 October 1872), cared for the elder Goethe until his death in 1832. They had three children: Walther, Freiherr von Goethe (9 April 1818 – 15 April 1885), Wolfgang, Freiherr von Goethe (18 September 1820 – 20 January 1883) and Alma von Goethe (29 October 1827 – 29 September 1844).
Christiane Vulpius died in 1816.
Later life
By 1820, he was on amiable terms with Kaspar Maria von Sternberg. Post-1793, Goethe devoted his endeavour principally to literature.
In 1832, after a life of vast productivity, Goethe died in Weimar. He is buried in the Ducal Vault at Weimar's Historical Cemetery.
Eckermann closes his famous work, Conversations with Goethe, with this passage:
The morning after Goethe's death, a deep desire seized me to look once again upon his earthly garment. His faithful servant, Frederick, opened for me the chamber in which he was laid out. Stretched upon his back, he reposed as if asleep; profound peace and security reigned in the features of his sublimely noble countenance. The mighty brow seemed yet to harbour thoughts. I wished for a lock of his hair; but reverence prevented me from cutting it off. The body lay naked, only wrapped in a white sheet; large pieces of ice had been placed near it, to keep it fresh as long as possible. Frederick drew aside the sheet, and I was astonished at the divine magnificence of the limbs. The breast was powerful, broad, and arched; the arms and thighs were elegant, and of the most perfect shape; nowhere, on the whole body, was there a trace of either fat or of leanness and decay. A perfect man lay in great beauty before me; and the rapture the sight caused me made me forget for a moment that the immortal spirit had left such an abode. I laid my hand on his heart - there was a deep silence - and I turned away to give free vent to my suppressed tears.
– (p. 426, Da Capo Press edition, John Oxenford translation)
Works
Main article: List of works by Johann Wolfgang Goethe
Literary work
"Modern Book Printing" from the Walk of Ideas in Berlin, Germany - built in 2006 to commemorate Johannes Gutenberg's invention, c. 1445, of movable printing typeThe most important of Goethe's works produced before he went to Weimar were his tragedy Götz von Berlichingen (1773), which was the first work to bring him recognition, and the novel The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774), which gained him enormous fame as a writer in the Sturm und Drang period which marked the early phase of Romanticism - indeed the book is often considered to be the "spark" which ignited the movement, and can arguably be called the world's first "best-seller". (For the entirety of his life this was the work with which the vast majority of Goethe's contemporaries associated him). During the years at Weimar before he met Schiller he began Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, wrote the dramas Iphigenie auf Tauris (Iphigenia in Tauris), Egmont, Torquato Tasso, and the fable Reineke Fuchs.
To the period of his friendship with Schiller belong Wilhelm Meister's Journeyman Years (the continuation of Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship), the idyll of Hermann and Dorothea, and the Roman Elegies. In the last period, between Schiller's death, in 1805, and his own, appeared Faust Part One, Elective Affinities, the West-Eastern Divan (a collection of poems in the Persian style, influenced by the work of Hafez), his autobiographical Aus meinem Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit (From My Life: Poetry and Truth) which covers his early life and ends with his departure for Weimar, his Italian Journey, and a series of treatises on art. His writings were immediately influential in literary and artistic circles.
Faust Part Two was only finished in the year of his death, and was published posthumously.
Scientific work
As to what I have done as a poet,… I take no pride in it… But that in my century I am the only person who knows the truth in the difficult science of colours - of that, I say, I am not a little proud, and here I have a consciousness of a superiority to many.
– Johann Eckermann, Conversations of Goethe
Although his literary work has attracted the greatest amount of interest, Goethe was also keenly involved in studies of natural science. He wrote several works on plant morphology, and colour theory.
With his focus on morphology he influenced Darwin. His studies led him to independently discover the human intermaxillary bone in 1784, which Broussonet (1779) and Vicq d'Azyr (1780) had (using different methods) identified several years earlier. While not the only one in his time to question the prevailing view that this bone did not exist in humans, Goethe, who believed ancient anatomists had known about this bone, was the first to prove its peculiarity to all mammals.
Light spectrum, from Theory of Colours – Goethe observed that with a prism, colour arises at the edges, and the spectrum occurs where these coloured edges overlapDuring his Italian journey, Goethe formulated a theory of plant metamorphosis in which the archetypal form of the plant is to be found in the leaf - he writes, "from top to bottom a plant is all leaf, united so inseparably with the future bud that one cannot be imagined without the other.".
In 1810, Goethe published his Theory of Colours, which he considered his most important work. In it, he (contentiously) characterized colour as arising from the dynamic interplay of darkness and light. After being translated into English by Charles Eastlake in 1840, this theory became widely adopted by the art world, most notably J. M. W. Turner (Bockemuhl, 1991). It also inspired the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, to write his Remarks on Colour. Goethe was vehemently opposed to Newton's analytic treatment of colour, engaging instead in compiling a comprehensive description of a wide variety of colour phenomena. Although Goethe cannot necessarily be criticized for the accuracy and extent of his observations, scientists in general have found little use for his theory because not much can be predicted by means of it. Goethe was, however, the first to systematically study the physiological effects of colour, and his observations on the effect of opposed colors led him to a symmetric arrangement of his colour wheel, 'for the colours diametrically opposed to each other… are those which reciprocally evoke each other in the eye. (Goethe, Theory of Colours, 1810 ). In this, he anticipated Ewald Hering's opponent color theory (1872).
Goethe outlines his method in the essay, The experiment as mediator between subject and object (1772). In the Kurschner edition of Goethe's works, the science editor, Rudolf Steiner, presents Goethe's approach to science as phenomenological. Steiner elaborated on this in the books The Theory of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World-Conception and Goethe's World View, in which he emphasizes the need of the perceiving organ of intuition in order to grasp Goethe's biological archetype (i.e. The Typus).
Key works
Statues of Goethe and Schiller, WeimarThe short epistolary novel, Die Leiden des jungen Werthers, or The Sorrows of Young Werther, published in 1774, recounts an unhappy romantic infatuation that ends in suicide. Goethe admitted that he "shot his hero to save himself": a reference to Goethe's own near-suicidal obsession with a young woman during this period, an obsession he quelled through the writing process. The novel remains in print in dozens of languages and its influence is undeniable; its central hero, an obsessive figure driven to despair and destruction by his unrequited love for the young Lotte, has become a pervasive literary archetype. The fact that Werther ends with the protagonist's suicide and funeral — a funeral which "no clergyman attended" — made the book deeply controversial upon its (anonymous) publication, for on the face of it, it appeared to condone and glorify suicide. Suicide was considered sinful by Christian doctrine: suicides were denied Christian burial with the bodies often mistreated and dishonoured in various ways; in corollary, the deceased's property and possessions were often confiscated by the Church. Epistolary novels were common during this time, letter-writing being a primary mode of communication. What set Goethe's book apart from other such novels was its expression of unbridled longing for a joy beyond possibility, its sense of defiant rebellion against authority, and of principal importance, its total subjectivity: qualities that trailblazed the Romantic movement.
The next work, his epic closet drama Faust, was to be completed in stages, and only published in its entirety after his death. The first part was published in 1808 and created a sensation. The first operatic version, by Spohr, appeared in 1814, and was subsequently the inspiration for operas and oratorios by Schumann, Gounod, Boito, Busoni, and Schnittke as well as symphonic works by Liszt, Wagner, and Mahler. Faust became the ur-myth of many figures in the 19th century. Later, a facet of its plot, i.e., of selling one's soul to the devil for power over the physical world, took on increasing literary importance and became a view of the victory of technology and of industrialism, along with its dubious human expenses. In 1919, the Goetheanum staged the world premiere of a complete production of Faust. On occasion, the play is still staged in Germany and other parts around the world.
Goethe's poetic work served as a model for an entire movement in German poetry termed Innerlichkeit ("introversion") and represented by, for example, Heine. Goethe's words inspired a number of compositions by, among others, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Berlioz and Wolf. Perhaps the single most influential piece is "Mignon's Song" which opens with one of the most famous lines in German poetry, an allusion to Italy: "Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn?" ("Do you know the land where the lemons bloom?").
Goethe in the Roman Campagna (1786) by Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein. Oil on canvas, 164 x 206 cm. Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt.He is also widely quoted. Epigrams such as "Against criticism a man can neither protest nor defend himself; he must act in spite of it, and then it will gradually yield to him", "Divide and rule, a sound motto; unite and lead, a better one", and "Enjoy when you can, and endure when you must", are still in usage or are often paraphrased. Lines from Faust, such as "Das also war des Pudels Kern", "Das ist der Weisheit letzter Schluss", or "Grau ist alle Theorie" have entered everyday German usage. Although a success of less tasteful appeal, the famous line from the drama Götz von Berlichingen ("Er kann mich im Arsche lecken": "He can lick my arse") has become a vulgar idiom in many languages, and shows Goethe's deep cultural impact extending across social, national, and linguistic borders.
It may be taken as another measure of Goethe's fame that other well-known quotations are often incorrectly attributed to him, such as Hippocrates' "Art is long, life is short", which is found in Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship.
Eroticism
Many of Goethe's works, especially Faust, the Roman Elegies, and the Venetian Epigrams, depict hetero- and homosexual erotic passions and acts. In Faust, having signed (the Devil insists on his signature in an actual contract) his deal with the devil, the very first use of his new power thus gained sees Faust raping a young teenage girl. In fact, some of the Venetian Epigrams were held back from publication due to their sexual content. However, Karl Hugo Pruys caused national controversy in Germany when his 1999 book The Tiger's Tender Touch: The Erotic Life of Goethe tentatively deduced from Goethe's writings the possibility of Goethe's homosexuality. The sexual portraitures and allusions in his work may stem from one of the many effects of Goethe's eye-opening sojourn in Italy, where men, who shunned the prevalence of women's venereal diseases and unconscionable conditions, embraced homosexuality as a solution that was not widely imitated outside of Italy. Whatever the case, Goethe clearly saw sexuality in general as a topic that merited poetic and artistic depiction. This went against the thought of his time, when the very private nature of sexuality was rigorously normative, and makes him appear more modern than he is typically thought to be.
Religion
Born into a Protestant (Lutheran) family, Goethe's early faith was shaken by news of such events as the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and the Seven Years' War. His later spiritual perspective evolved among pantheism, humanism, and various elements of Western esotericism, as seen most vividly in Part II of Faust.
A year before his death he expressed an identification with the Hypsistarians, an ancient Jewish-pagan sect of the Black Sea region. After describing his difficulties with mainstream religion, Goethe laments:
…I have found no confession of faith to which I could ally myself without reservation. Now in my old age, however, I have learned of a sect, the Hypsistarians, who, hemmed in between heathens, Jews and Christians, declared that they would treasure, admire, and honour the best, the most perfect that might come to their knowledge, and inasmuch as it must have a close connection to the Godhead, pay it reverence. A joyous light thus beamed at me suddenly out of a dark age, for I had the feeling that all my life I had been aspiring to qualify as a Hypsistarian. That, however, is no small task, for how does one, in the limitations of one's individuality, come to know what is most excellent?
– from a letter to Sulpiz Boisserée dated 22 March 1831
Historical importance
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Goethe had a great effect on the 19th century. In many respects, he was the originator of many ideas which later became widespread. He produced volumes of poetry, essays, criticism, a theory of optics and early work on evolution and linguistics. He was fascinated by mineralogy, and the mineral goethite is named after him. His non-fiction writings, most of which are philosophic and aphoristic in nature, spurred the development of many philosophers, including G.W.F. Hegel, Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ernst Cassirer, Carl Jung, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. Along with Schiller, he was one of the leading figures of Weimar Classicism. Goethe is remembered with special fondness by followers of 20th century esoteric figure Rudolf Steiner - who named the Goetheanum after him, where festival performances of Faust are still performed today. In contemporary culture, he stands in the background as the author of the story upon which Disney's The Sorcerer's Apprentice is based.
Second GoetheanumGoethe embodied many of the contending strands in art over the next century: his work could be lushly emotional, and rigorously formal, brief and epigrammatic, and epic. He would argue that classicism was the means of controlling art, and that romanticism was a sickness, even as he penned poetry rich in memorable images, and rewrote the formal rules of German poetry.
His poetry was set to music by almost every major Austrian and German composer from Mozart to Mahler, and his influence would spread to French drama and opera as well. Beethoven declared that a "Faust" Symphony would be the greatest thing for Art. Liszt and Mahler both created symphonies in whole or in large part inspired by this seminal work, which would give the 19th century one of its most paradigmatic figures: Doctor Faustus. The Faust tragedy/drama, often called "Das Drama der Deutschen" (the drama of the Germans), written in two parts published decades apart, would stand as his most characteristic and famous artistic creation.
Goethe was also a cultural force, and by researching folk traditions, he created many of the norms for celebrating Christmas, and argued that the organic nature of the land moulded the people and their customs—an argument that has recurred ever since, including recently in the work of Jared Diamond. He argued that laws could not be created by pure rationalism, since geography and history shaped habits and patterns. This stood in sharp contrast to the prevailing Enlightenment view that reason was sufficient to create well-ordered societies and good laws.
Influence
Goethe's influence was dramatic because he understood that there was a transition in European sensibilities, an increasing focus on sense, the indescribable, and the emotional. This is not to say that he was emotionalistic or excessive; on the contrary, he lauded personal restraint and felt that excess was a disease: "There is nothing worse than imagination without taste". He argued in his scientific works that a "formative impulse", which he said is operative in every organism, causes an organism to form itself according to its own distinct laws, and therefore rational laws or fiats could not be imposed at all from a higher, transcendent sphere; this placed him in direct opposition to those who attempted to form "enlightened" monarchies based on "rational" laws by, for example, Joseph II of Austria or, the subsequent Emperor of the French, Napoleon I. A quotation from his Scientific Studies will suffice:
We conceive of the individual animal as a small world, existing for its own sake, by its own means. Every creature is its own reason to be. All its parts have a direct effect on one another, a relationship to one another, thereby constantly renewing the circle of life; thus we are justified in considering every animal physiologically perfect. Viewed from within, no part of the animal is a useless or arbitrary product of the formative impulse (as so often thought). Externally, some parts may seem useless because the inner coherence of the animal nature has given them this form without regard to outer circumstance. Thus…[not] the question, What are they for? but rather, Where do they come from?
– Suhrkamp ed., vol 12, p. 121; trans. Douglas Miller, Scientific Studies
This change later became the basis for 19th century thought; organic rather than geometrical, evolving rather than created, and based on sensibility and intuition, rather than on imposed order, culminating in, as he said, a "living quality" wherein the subject and object are dissolved together in a poise of inquiry. Consequently, he embraced neither teleological nor deterministic views of growth within every organism. Instead, the world as a whole grows through continual, external, and internal strife. Moreover, he did not embrace the mechanistic views that contemporaneous science subsumed during his time, and there with he denied rationality's superiority as the sole interpretation of reality. Furthermore, he declared that all knowledge is related to humanity through its functional value alone and that knowledge presupposes a perspectival quality. He also stated that the fundamental nature of the world is aesthetic.
His views make him, along with Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, and Ludwig van Beethoven, a figure in two worlds: on the one hand, devoted to the sense of taste, order, and finely crafted detail, which is the hallmark of the artistic sense of the Age of Reason and the neo-classicistic period of architecture; on the other, seeking a personal, intuitive, and personalized form of expression and society, firmly supporting the idea of self-regulating and organic systems. Thinkers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson would take up many similar ideas in the 1800s. His ideas on evolution would frame the question which Darwin and Wallace would approach within the scientific paradigm.
Bibliography
Goethe: The History of a Man by Emil Ludwig
Goethe by Georg Brandes
Goethe: his life and times by Richard Friedenthal
Lotte in Weimar: The Beloved Returns by Thomas Mann
Conversations with Goethe by Johann Peter Eckermann
Goethe's World: as seen in letters and memoirs ed. by Berthold Biermann
Goethe: Four Studies by Albert Schweitzer
Goethe and his Publishers by Siegfied Unseld
Goethe: The Poet and the Age (2 Vols.), by Nicholas Boyle
Goethe's Concept of the Daemonic: After the Ancients, by Angus Nicholls
Goethe and Rousseau: Resonances of ther Mind, by Carl Hammer, Jr.
References
^ dictionary.com
^ Eliot, George (2004). in Gregory Maertz (ed.): Middlemarch. Broadview Press. ISBN. Note by editor of 2004 edition, Gregory Maertz, http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1551112337&id=4MopnRJ-HmMC&pg=PA710&lpg=PA710&sig=4nAO63zmLS9Ua-x0mevpZA7kSIY p. 710
^ http://www.bartleby.com/65/go/Goethe-J.html Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th Ed. (2001-2005).
^ Darwin, C. R. 1859. On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. London: John Murray. 1st edition.http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?itemID=F373&viewtype=text&pageseq=165&keywords=goethe
^ a b Opitz, John (2004). "Goethe's bone and the beginnings of morphology". American Journal of Medical Genetics Part A 126A (1): 1–8. doi:10.1002/ajmg.a.20619.
^ see Goethe and his Publishers
^ Safranski, Rüdiger, Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy, Harvard University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-674-79275-0
^ http://www.natureinstitute.org/about/who/goethe.htm The Nature Institute - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
^ Darwin, C. R. 1859. On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. London: John Murray. 1st edition.http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?itemID=F373&viewtype=text&pageseq=165&keywords=goethe
^ K. Barteczko and M. Jacob (1999). "A re-evaluation of the premaxillary bone in humans". Anatomy and Embryology 207 (6): 417–437. doi:10.1007/s00429-003-0366-x.
^ http://books.google.com/books?id=0Fjuaog1_E0C&pg=PA86&lpg=PA86&ots=ezKJugQmvs&dq=intermaxillary+bone+prove&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html&sig=jkPjZ1STzEfso5aFHxmFqxeof18] In 1790, he published his Metamorphosis of Plants
^ Goethe, J.W.. Italian Journey. Suhrkamp ed., vol 6.
^ Bockemuhl, M. (1991). Turner. Taschen, Koln. ISBN 3-8228-6325-4.
^ Goethe, Johann (1810). Theory of Colours, paragraph #50.
^ Goethe's Color Theory
^ GA002: The Theory of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception
^ Goethe's World View
^ Pips Project – THE STIGMA OF SUICIDE A History
^ Ophelia's Burial
^ Karl Hugo Pruys, The Tiger's Tender Touch: The Erotic Life of Goethe. Trans. Kathleen Bunten. (Edition Q, 1999). ISBN 1883695120.
^ Outing Goethe and His Age, edited by Alice A. Kuzniar (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1996) (page number needed). ISBN 0804726159.
^ Outing Goethe and His Age; edited by Alice A. Kuzniar (page number needed)
^ quoted in Peter Boerner, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1832/1982: A Biographical Essay. Bonn: Inter Nationes, 1981 p. 82]