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A Study of Goethe.
viii 280p yellow paperback, index, clean pages, very good, still a nice copy, this copy published in the year 1961
- GenresLiterature
280 pages, Hardcover
First published March 23, 1977
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October 2, 2015
This is the work of a scholar who clearly has drunk in, throught and re-thought everything there was to think about Goethe, and produced a matured appreciation of Goethe's life and work, devoid of excess. It feels like preceeding essays are to this one as Goethe's prototypes of Faust are to the final version
I read this book for simple reasons: I found it on a train station in France, all the other books were in French while this one was in English. I had wanted for some time to know more about Goethe, of which here and there and everwhere, like Hegel, there are suggestions to his work. And at the same time knowing that poetry is the most untranslateable of forms, and the day that I understand German, is a long way off still if it will even be. This would do for now.
I got from the book some of what I wanted, and also something more. Often I feel overwhealmed that everyone else out there, though it is usually a farce, has it figured out. They're going somewhere, they're doing things, while I still feel I'm trying to find my way. When I was younger this was accepted but as I get old this seems to become more and more impermissible, and I feel pushed into finding a Way, when I realize now that I want to is to continue to become Lost.
And that's why I enjoyed how the author related Goethe's life, that he was in constant rebellion in his mind all his life, and that it only had some respite as he got older, and yet it is exactly because of this, contrary to what the world may suggest, that his genius was allowed to sparkle, why his life was so exciting. How a turmoil of emotions, good and bad, might not be necessary for an artist, but definitely is for a genius. And sometimes you have to wait and keep growing, for things to come out just right, though it might take decades, or a whole life, evne if you are a master, like Liszt's Sonata in B Minor did.
It again made me feel safe in not following the beaten track, reminding me again that Ad Populum, though sometimes so desperately convincing, is nevertheless definitely invalid.
I read this book for simple reasons: I found it on a train station in France, all the other books were in French while this one was in English. I had wanted for some time to know more about Goethe, of which here and there and everwhere, like Hegel, there are suggestions to his work. And at the same time knowing that poetry is the most untranslateable of forms, and the day that I understand German, is a long way off still if it will even be. This would do for now.
I got from the book some of what I wanted, and also something more. Often I feel overwhealmed that everyone else out there, though it is usually a farce, has it figured out. They're going somewhere, they're doing things, while I still feel I'm trying to find my way. When I was younger this was accepted but as I get old this seems to become more and more impermissible, and I feel pushed into finding a Way, when I realize now that I want to is to continue to become Lost.
And that's why I enjoyed how the author related Goethe's life, that he was in constant rebellion in his mind all his life, and that it only had some respite as he got older, and yet it is exactly because of this, contrary to what the world may suggest, that his genius was allowed to sparkle, why his life was so exciting. How a turmoil of emotions, good and bad, might not be necessary for an artist, but definitely is for a genius. And sometimes you have to wait and keep growing, for things to come out just right, though it might take decades, or a whole life, evne if you are a master, like Liszt's Sonata in B Minor did.
It again made me feel safe in not following the beaten track, reminding me again that Ad Populum, though sometimes so desperately convincing, is nevertheless definitely invalid.
Displaying 1 of 1 review