Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang Goethe is widely recognized as the greatest writer of the German tradition. The Romantic period in Germany (the late eighteenth and early nineteengh centuries) is known as the age of Goethe, and Goethe embodies the concerns of the generation defined by the legacies of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanual Kant, and the French Revolution. His stature derives not only from his literary achievments as a lyric poet, novelist, and dramatist but also from his often significant contributions as a scientist (geologist, botanist, anatomist, physicist, historian of science) and as a critic and theorist of literature and of art.

Goethe is often ranked with Shakespeare and Dante as one of the three most important poets in history. He spent the most important part of his life in Weimar and served the duchy in many official capacities. Although his interests ranged from biology to the theory of color, it is his literature, with its powerful presentation of human freedom and the search for meaning in life, that has been of enduring value.

In the first World War British propagandists used to cite ... a few lines from Goethe's Faust. But they omitted to mention that the character ... Euphorion, is a counterpart of Lord Byron, whom Goethe admired more than any other contemporary poet (except for Schiller), although Byron's romanticism did not appeal to his own classicism. ... It is contradictory ... to consider only famous men as representative while ignoring the rest ... One man of this group may stand out as much from the rest as the whole group does from the entire nation. Hundreds of poetasters and rhymesters do not outweigh the unique Goethe.

... Goethe, the greatest of all German writers and poets and one of the giants of world literature. In his political outlook, he was also a thorough-going classical liberal, arguing that free trade and free cultural exchange are the keys to authentic national and international integration. He argued and fought against the expansion, centralization, and unification of government on grounds that these trends can only hinder prosperity and true cultural development. ... Pertinent today as they were when written, Goethe's insights regarding the social and political foundations of culture still demand our attention.

... Goethe intellectually, Goethe as a power acting upon the age in which he lived ... In 1832, it was announced by the post-horns of all Europe as the death of him who had written the Wilhelm Meister, the Iphigenie, and the Faust, and who had been enthroned by some of his admirers on the same seat with Homer and Shakespeare, as composing what they termed the trinity of men of genius. And yet it is a fact, that, in the opinion of some amongst the acknowledged leaders of our own literature for the last twenty-five years, the Werther was superior to all which followed it, and for mere power was the paramount work of Goethe.

Born in 1749 in the free imperial city of Frankfurt am Main into an upper-middle-class family, Goethe studied law in Leipzig and Strasbourg. However, on receiving his doctorate and practicing briefly as a lawyer, he set out on a spectacularly successful career as poet, dramatist, novelist, lyricist, artist, and critic of architecture, art, literature, and music. He was also a natural scientist and a student of anatomy, botany, morphology, and optics. To this day, he defines the meaning of genius, with a life oeuvre encompassing more than 60 volumes ...

Most Americans ... view their federal government as a beloved parent, one who never lies to them; who takes care of them and gives them "freedom" ... Most of the rest of the world sees the reality—an increasingly oppressive and military-oriented government ... whose officials often lie ... Maybe the Cuban Interest Section in Washington ought to construct its own billboard and post the following message for Americans to read, "Johann Goethe said that none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. Who are freer—the Cuban people or the American people?"