Frauen, Dichten, Goethe: Die produktive Goethe-Rezeption bei Charlottevon Stein, Marianne von Willemer und Bettina von Arnim by Markus Wallenborn

Abstract

MLR, I03.3, 2oo8 889 attempt to take seriously Goethe's assertion that his concept of the daemonic was modelled 'after the ancients'. This proves helpful both in shedding thebiographical approach toGoethe and inestablishing thephilosophical content of thedaemonic and its role indebates concerning subjectivity, reason, and nature. On thisbasis Nicholls can show how Goethe's concept of the daemonic was informed by his debates with major thinkersof his time:Hamann, Herder, Kant, and Schelling. The study thus presents a broad ifnecessarily fragmentary picture of Goethe's poetic and intellectual development. For theGoethe of theSturm undDrang, follow ing earlymodern readings of Stoicism and Neoplatonism, the daemonic represents thenotion that inexceptional cases human capacities (and specifically thecreative and imaginative powers) mediate between the realms of thehuman and thedivine. During Goethe's classical period, however, thedaemonic becomes an external force that sets limits to the pretensions of subjectivity. Here Goethe again reconnects with the an cient tradition, and specificallywith Plato, for whom thedaemonic isconnected with the taskof thephilosopher. The Platonic philosopher is like a daemon who mediates between thematerial world and the forms,and thatmediation contains an element of eros. This, then, is aGoethe who isboth classical and Romantic: Nicholls breaks with theGermanic tradition of opposing classicism toRomanticism, pointing out, quite rightly,that theRomantic Hellenism ofGoethe and others establishes the ideal of an art that takes its forms from the perfection found in nature. Following M. H. Abrams, Nicholls argues thatRomanticism engages in the secularization of religious and Platonic thought, although onemight askwhether secularization is the right term in the lattercase. None the less, classicism ismore prominent. Excess subjectivity is (Romantic) ill ness: (classical) health, then, involves our recognizing thenecessary gaps between our ideas about theworld and theworld an sich,and our adjusting our ideas in the lightof and with continual reference toexternal conditions. Within this classical framework, the daemonic acts as a means of representing what Hans Blumenberg termed the 'ungeloster Rest' that remainswhen reason isexhausted. In this sense thedaemonic isconnected toGoethe's notion of the 'Urphanomen' as a limitbeyond which human reason cannot venture. The sonnet 'Machtiges Uberrraschen' presents a symbolic version of this ideal of subjectivity productively confined. Indeed, a series of analyses of poetic representations ofwater (inWerther, Faust, and 'Mahometsgesang') help fullypoints up the nuanced evolution ofGoethe's conceptions of the daemonic. Of particular importance in this story is the emphasis thatNicholls places on Goethe's Kant-influenced thoughts on scientificmethod. The storyofGoethe's turn from the Geniezeit to classicism has been toldmany times before, but seldom in such philo sophical detail orwith such a range of reference toEuropean intellectual history. KING'S COLLEGE LONDON MATTHEW BELL Frauen-Dichten- Goethe: DieproduktiveGoethe-Rezeptionbei Charlotte vonStein, Marianne von Willemer und Bettina von Arnim. By MARKUS WALLENBORN. (Untersuchungen zur deutschen Literaturgeschichte, 129) Tiibingen: Niemeyer. 2oo6. ix+34opp. E62. ISBN978-3-484-32129-6. Markus Wallenborn's doctoral dissertation is an attempt to reassess thework of three women belonging to thatdisparate group of 'Frauen um Goethe' who came into con tactat some stagewith the most famouswriter of theirage. By looking again at the lives and work of Charlotte von Stein, Marianne vonWillemer, and Bettina von Arnim, Wallenborn hopes to show how thewomen engaged with Goethe and his ceuvre and how thishelped them to develop aswriters in theirown right. Wallenborn isdismis sive of recent feminist research which he claims plays down Goethe's influence on 890 Reviews women writers in thisperiod. It is only when they are viewed in relation toGoethe, he argues, thatwriters such as Stein, Willemer, and Arnim can be taken seriously. The threeparts of the study deal with each of the threewomen in turn. Wallenborn provides detailed information about theirpersonal relations toGoethe and examines their letters, poems, plays, and novels against this backdrop. The situation of each woman isslightlydifferent.Stein isprompted to takeup her pen after meeting Goethe in Weimar in the 1770s; her early playlet Rino includes a spirited caricature of the celebrated author ofWerther. Over the years, as her friendship with Goethe turns sour, Stein gains more confidence and begins to address broader themes inher texts. Willemer looks continually toher beloved Goethe for inspiration and sees herwork as part of an ongoing dialogue with him: they read thePersian poet...