Major Works of Goethe (1749-1832).  Last taught in the spring of '98.
German Studies 357
Wed 2:30-4:30
GS 181

 
Poet, statesman, artist, scientist, rebel, conservative, mythmaker and iconoclast, Goethe stands at the center of Germany's belated Renaissance.  Taking his early cues from Homer, Shakespeare and the Bible, he created cultural icons at once modern and steeped in tradition.  We will examine works from all phases of the man's incredibly productive life against the background of political turmoil in Europe and the Americas.  We will use the visual arts, music and theater as additional tools of interpretation.

1    Hymnen und Lieder

2    Lieder und Balladen
 
3    The best seller.
    Werther  (I)  Image.
 
4    Werther  (II)  Mirror image.

5    Faust
       (I)  The scholar

6    Faust
       (II)  The lover

7    Faust
       (III)  The fugitive. Gretchen in der Hoelle.

8    Faust
       (IV)  The colonizer

9    Faust
       (V)  Dies irae/Day of Grace

10   Pure Politics
       Egmont

11   A Family Affair
       Iphigenie auf Tauris

12   What's the point of a poet?
       Torquato Tasso
 
13    Human chemistry
        Die Wahlverwandtschaften
 
14    Und es war alles alles gut
        Novelle
 


 

Reserve List.

I have put all 14 volumes of the incomparable Hamburger Ausgabe (ed. Erich Trunz) on 2-day reserve in the Uris Library Reading Room. Although not the latest edition it is the best comprehensive Studienausgabe available. Please use it regularly. Notes, commentary and bibliography incorporate the relevant critical material up to the time of publication (1958-60).

The most comprehensive edition, the monumental Weimarer Ausgabe, is available on CD-ROM in the Electronic Text Center in Olin Library. For additional holdings check: Cornell Holdings .
The library has now added a networked version of this extensive database.  You may want to take a look from your own computer. It can be found at http://etext.library.cornell.edu/goethe/. It is also on the Library Gateway.  Search with "Goethe."

Volumes 18, 19, and 20 of the German Library contain the works we are treating in English translation. They are on the reserve shelf. Feel free to use them as a study aid. But please remember, you are responsible for the German text and you must quote from it even in your English papers.

Nicholas Boyle, Goethe: The Poet and the Age.
Stuart Atkins, Essays on Goethe. Ed. Jane K. Brown and Thomas P. Saine.
Ronald Gray, Goethe: A Critical Introduction.
Richard Friedenthal, Goethe: His Life and Times.
Liselotte Dieckmann, Goethe's Faust: A Critical Reading.
Eudo. C. Mason, Goethe's Faust: It's Genesis and Purport.
Jane K. Brown, Goethe's Faust: The German Tragedy.
Eric A. Blackall, Goethe's Novels.

Consult also (not on reserve):

Jeffrey Burton Russell, Mephistopheles.
Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan.
Jaroslav Pelikan, Faust the Theologian (see my review).
Roger Shattuck, Forbidden Knowledge.

Herbert Deinert, "Die Entfaltung des Boesen in Boehmes MYSTERIUM MAGNUM." PMLA, September '64. Please read part II, "Luzifer", in particular.
Guenther Boehme, Bildungsgeschichte des europaeischen Humanismus (1986).
Jochen Schmidt, Die Geschichte des Genie-Gedankens 1750-1945. 2 vols. (1985).
 
Video recordings of the pieces or inspired by them will appear on the reserve list as we get to them. Stay tuned.