A Companion To Goethes Faust

Cutting-edge criticism on major aspects of Goethe's best-known work. Undisputedly a canonical work, Goethe's Faust is also the key to understanding its author, one of European civilization's most complex figures. Written over several decades, the work spans both Goethe's life and an age of enormous social, political, philosophical, and artistic change - even revolution. In this volume, Goethe scholars and experts from Europe and North America explore major aspects of this fascinating work, offering a cutting-edge guide to both reader and scholar. Contributors: Ritchie Robertson, Martin Swales, Alberto Destro, Osman Durrani, Ellis Dye, John R. Williams, Anthony Phelan, Franziska Schößler, Peter D. Smith, Cyrus Hamlin, R.H. Stephenson, David Luke, Robert David McDonald Paul Bishop is William Jacks Chair of Modern Languages at the University of Glasgow.

He is self-alienated man struggling to expand beyond the limitations of intellect and the known world, desperate to achieve a state, indeed mystical, where the opposites of Knowledge and Sensuality are One. Part One of Faust records that attempt in the context of earthly existence. Part Two unreels itself in the realm of myth, of classical antiquity, and of dream. Goethe's Faust has rightly been called the most audacious work in Western Civilization."--Jacket.

Loosely connected with Part One and the German legend of Faust, Part Two is a dramatic epic rather than a strictly constructed drama. It is conceived as an act of homage to classical Greek culture and inspired above all by the world of story-telling and myth at the heart of the Greek tradition, as well as owing some of its material to the Arabian Nights tales. The restless and ruthless hero, advised by his cynical demon-companion Mephistopheles, visits classical Greece i search of the beautiful Helen of Troy. Returning to modern times, he seeks to crown his career by gaining control of the elements, and at his death is carried up into the unkown regions, still in pursuit of the `Eternal Feminine'. David Luke's translation of Part One won the European Poetry Translation Prize. Here he again imitates the varied verse-forms of the original, and provides a highly readable - and actable - translation, supported by an introduction, full notes, and an index of classical mythology. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Faust: A Tragedy Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - The story of Dr. Faustus and the Devil is one of such deep human significance, and, from the Reformation downwards, of such large European reputation, that in giving some account of its origin, character, treatment, legendary and poetical, I shall seem to be only gratifying a very natural curiosity on the part of the intelligent reader. We, who live in the nineteenth century, in a period of the world's intellectual development, which may be called the age of spiritual doubt and scepticism, in contradistinction to the age of faith and reverence in things traditional, which was first shaken to its centre by the violent shock of the Reformation, can have little sympathy with the opinions as to spiritual beings, demoniacal agency, magic, and theosophy, that were so universally prevalent in the sixteenth century. We believe in the existence of angels and spirits, because the Scriptures make mention of such spiritual beings; but this belief occupies a place as little prominent in our theology, as its influence is almost null in regard to actual life. In the sixteenth century, however, Demonology and Angelography were sciences of no common importance; and were, too, a fruitful root whence the occult lore of the sages, and the witch, ghost, and magic craft of the many took their rise, and spread themselves out into a tree, whose branches covered the whole earth with their shadow. From the earliest Christian fathers, to the last lingering theosophists of the seventeenth century, we can trace a regular and unshaken system of belief in the existence of infinite demons and angels in immediate connection with this lower world, with whom it was not only possible, but of very frequent occurrence, for men to have familiar intercourse. Psellus,[i1] the "prince of philosophers," does not disdain to enter into a detailed account of the nature and influence of demons, and seems to give full faith to the very rankest old wives' fables of dæmones incubi et succubi, afterwards so well known in the trials for witchcraft which disgraced the history of criminal law not more than two centuries ago. Giordano Bruno, the poet, the philosopher, and free-thinker of his day, to whom the traditionary doctrines of the Church were as chaff before the wind, was by no means free from the belief in magic, the fixed idea of the age in which he lived. "O! quanta virtus," says he, in all the ebullition of his vivid fancy, "O quanta virtus est intersectionibus circulorum et quam sensibus hominum occulta!!! cum caput draconis in sagittario exstiterit, diacedio lapide posito in aqua, naturaliter (!) spiritus ad dandum responsa veniunt."[i2] The comprehensive mind of Cornelius Agrippa, the companion of kings and of princes, soon sprung beyond the Cabbalistical and Platonical traditions of his youth; but not less is his famous book "De Philosophia Occulta" a good specimen of the intellectual character of the age in which he lived. The noted work "De Vanitate Scientiarum" is a child of Agrippa, not of the sixteenth century. The names of Cardan, Campanella, Reuchlin, Tritheim, Pomponatius, Dardi, Mirandula, and many others, might be added as characteristic children of the same spirit-stirring era; all more or less uniting a strange belief in the most baseless superstitions, with deep profundity of thought, and comprehensive grasp of erudition.

Based on the fable of the man who traded his soul for superhuman powers and knowledge, it became the life's work of Germany's greatest poet, Goethe. Beginning with an intriguing wager between God and Satan, it charts the life of a deeply flawed individual, his struggle against the nihilism of his diabolical companion Mephistopheles. Part One presents Faust's pact with the Devil and the harrowing tragedy of his love affair with the young Gretchen. Part Two shows Faust's experience in the world of public affairs, including his encounter with Helen of Troy, the emblem of classical beauty and culture. The whole is a symbolic and panoramic commentary on the human condition and on modern European history and civilisation. Includes unique illustrations.