Goethe

This short description and analysis of the life and work of Goethe centers on his personal development as expressed in his relationship with ' nature'. As Reed understands it Goethe's direct experience of nature was immediately transformed into poetry. Goethe sought and found in Nature inherent and organic development, the very process which shaped the world and his own inner life into wholeness. Reed traces Goethe's literary career from the sensational success of Werther through the period of Wilhelm Meister, then the period of plays, the ten years of virtual silence in Weimar, then the Italian journey and renewal toward the final development of Faust. He shows how Goethe despite uneasy times, and difficult moods lived truly the life of the happy genius, achieving a kind of harmony and wholeness which is rare among great creators. This is an excellent work though there is a feeling of special pleading in the championing of works of art which however much they resound with readers of German do not seem to have attracted a real readership in the world today.