Goethe (Life & Times)

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was an exceptionally prolific and versatile writer. As a student, he composed pastoral plays in the style of the waning Rococo. With "Götz von Berlichingen", a drama conceived in the spirit of Shakespeare, he joined the avant-garde 'Storm and Stress' authors. When he was twenty-five, he wrote the epistolary novel Sorrows of Young Werther, eliciting fervent responses among those who rejected the traditions of the Enlightenment. In his tragedy "Faust", which evolved over a sixty-year period, he created a prototype of the Romantic hero. His lyric poetry has been translated into many languages. As minister of state in the Duchy of Sachsen-Weimar he dealt with financial, ecological, and cultural issues. A scientist active in various fields, including botany and the theory of colors, he pondered aspects of evolution well before Darwin. Based on his studies in literary theory he developed a concept of 'world literature' that he hoped would foster communication among writers of different nations. Among his early admirers in England and America were Lord Byron, Thomas Carlyle, Joseph Cogswell, and Ralph Waldo Emerson.