Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Text: The Sorrows of Young Werther (Die Leiden des jungen Werthers)
Published: 1774
Language written in: German
I thought it appropriate for the first work in this series to be that of one of the first proponents of World Literature – or as he called it, Weltliteratur. Probably the only text in this series that I will be able to read in the author’s first language (apart from those English), this novel was written in German in the 18th century, so is quite far removed from the globalised context of 21st century literature. Anyway, onto the review. Goethe was, undoubtedly, a literary genius. His works spanned decades in various forms, a multitude of subject matters and several literary epochs. But I really hated this book.
I’ll rewind and give you a bit of a summary. Written as an epistolary novel from the wealthy, young ‘Werther’ to his friend ‘Wilhelm’, the novel narrates Werther’s life of luxury as he spends time in the countryside busying himself with painting and writing poetry, and not much else. Until he meets Lotte, an engaged young woman, who eventually comes to consume his every thought. As a novel written through letters, we, as the reader, encounter every thought and feeling that he wants to express, every minute obsession over the woman that he is infatuated with. Very little actually happens in the narrative that can be related to you, the bulk of the novel comes in the descriptions of feelings felt by the young man. Coming out of a period very much at odds with the Enlightenment philosophy of the 18th century (namely, Sturm und Drang literature), it must have been quite revolutionary to express such emotion for a young man. This kind of emotionalism was later taken up by the Romantics in English, but Goethe’s work was part of a precursor to that movement. So I can understand why it was so popular and purported to be the first international bestseller. But as a modern reader, it seems impossible to not want to shout at him to pull himself together, come out of his morose state, and try and go after another girl! Maybe this is a simplistic (and somewhat unsympathetic) way to look at his deep emotional turmoil, but that was my gut reaction.
It had a profound effect on the contemporary readership, and became significant for the copycat suicides that it induced. (Oh, SPOILER alert, by the way). Goethe, himself, hated it in later life, and believed that people had misunderstood him; that he was not actually advocating senseless emotionalism, but critiquing it. Nonetheless, in the original German, and in many English translations (available online through Project Gutenberg) the language is beautiful. It is very poetic and worth the annoyance at Werther for the beauty of the language alone.