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Goethe and the Sublime
(2013)
The dissertation situates the Goethean sublime in an obscured countermovement of resistance to the aestheticization the concept underwent in the 18th century. Before the encounter with the English aesthetic concept of the sublime, the German notion of das Erhabene (the sublime) named not a category of aesthetic experience, but a social affect. In contrast to the Sublime of Edmund Burke's theory, which explicitly excludes melancholy from the sources of the Sublime, das Erhabene is an affect related to the self-overcoming of melancholic subjectivity. As the aestheticized notion of the sublime displaced das Erhabene, Goethe became one of the most radical innovators of the aesthetics of the sublime. But as is demonstrated in chapters on The Sorrows of Young Werther, Elective Affinities, Faust and Wilhelm Meister, he did so with the aim of recovering the displaced meaning of das Erhabene as social affect. Goethe's sublime aims to show at every turn that the so-called "aesthetic experience" of the sublime is really displaced social affect. His treatment of the sublime therefore constitutes a radical critique of the establishment of aesthetics as an independent sphere of inquiry. There is for Goethe no way to understand aesthetic experience independently of its social context. By reconnecting the sublime it to the original social meaning of das Erhabene, Goethe recovers the aesthetics of the sublime as a means of mediating and facilitating the movement of subjectivity from frustrated stasis to divine creativity; i.e., from exclusion to participation in the material creation of reality.
Taking as starting point some collective volumes since the year 2000 which aspire to provide new views on narratology, this essay discusses the problem of how to conceive the history of narratology in a way that is more enlightening than the linear narrative used so far to tell this story. It lists some aspects which are neglected by the usual narrative and favors a decentered conception of narratology’s development.
Iqbal and Goethe : a note
(2005)
The recourse to Goethe plays an important role in the work of Mohammad Iqbal (1873-1938), one of the few important writers from the Indian subcontinent who knew German literature. Iqbal situates his own writing in the context of western colonial expansion and the corresponding world-historical loss of power of Islam in the East. The recourse to Goethe becomes an import reference point in his work. It enables him to stylise himself as a Messenger of the East in reply to Goethe as a representative of the West. By establishing a comparative cultural constellation with his German predecessor Iqbal affirms a cultural position consisting of a mode of historical complaint and cultural revival.
Wozu Dichter?
(2010)
Goethe's Tasso is no "Dichter in duerftiger Zeit." He is rather duerftig himself, unbalanced and impulsive in the extreme. In fact, in an annoyed moment, the diplomat Antonio sees him as a useless and pampered brat and undiplomatically says so, triggering a fateful sequence of events that generate a seemingly unstoppable momentum.
Gretchen's infanticide
(2010)
In the scene At The Well, Gretchen herself describes the sequence of events best and in all their fateful simplicity. It is the progress from "sin" to "shame", that is to public disgrace as soon as her private transgression becomes "visible" as pregnancy. Already here the painful confusion over her private perception ("good, dear love", lines 3585/6) and public judgment ("slut", line 3753) which will eventually drive her mad is obvious. In her derangement and despair she will destroy the evidence against her, that is, drown her child.
Goethe - Egmont
(2010)
Goethe : Novelle
(2010)
Eckermann reports a conversation with Goethe on January 29, 1827: Es kam sodann zur Sprache, welchen Titel man der Novelle geben sollte; wir taten manche Vorschlaege, einige waren gut fuer den Anfang, andere gut fuer das Ende, doch fand sich keiner, der fuer das Ganze passend und also der rechte gewesen waere. "Wissen Sie was", sagte Goethe, "wir wollen es die Novelle nennen; denn was ist eine Novelle anders als eine sich ereignete unerhoerte Begebenheit. Dies ist der eigentliche Begriff, und so vieles, was in Deutschland unter dem Titel Novelle geht, ist gar keine Novelle, sondern bloss Erzaehlung oder was Sie sonst wollen. In jenem urspruenglichen Sinne einer unerhoerten Begebenheit kommt auch die Novelle in den Wahlverwandtschaften vor." This is the epilogue, as it were, to a lengthy conversation on January 15, 1827, in which Goethe interprets his own Novelle. Here an excerpt, a highly condensed analysis: Zu zeigen, wie das Unbaendige, Unueberwindliche oft besser durch Liebe und Froemmigkeit als durch Gewalt bezwungen werde, war die Aufgabe dieser Novelle, und dieses schoene Ziel, welches sich im Kinde und Loewen darstellt, reizte mich zur Ausfuehrung. Dies ist das Ideelle, dies die Blume. Und das gruene Blaetterwerk der durchaus realen Exposition ist nur dieserwegen da und nur dieserwegen etwas wert.
Beethoven's Ninth in Bailey Hall the other evening, April 20, ending in an instant standing ovation by a clearly enchanted audience, was an unforgettable experience. And, like all such truly extraordinary events that are marked not only by artistic merit, but draw their power from the circumstances surrounding their creation or performance, it recalled others and enhanced their significance. I was reminded of a stellar performance on Christmas Day of 1989, only weeks after the unexpected fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, that haunting date in German history. Few people believed it would ever happen. But now, suddenly, reunification in justice and freedom, as the truncated old national anthem phrases it, was within reach.
Moreno noted a similarity between a late 18th Century play by the great German scholar and artist, Goethe, and some elements of psychodrama, which can be substantiated; however, Goethe was not, as Moreno suggested, an early promoter of spontaneity. The similarities and contrasts between these two men are intriguing.