The Sorrows of Young Werther
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote the book “The Sorrows of Young Werther” in 1774. Originally, the book is in German language, and it was initially published in the year 1774. In English language, it was initially published in 1779.
Summary of the Book
The Sorrows of Young Werther has a number of letters by the main character, Werther, who is an artist having a passionate and sensitive temperament, to Wilhelm, one of the friends of Werther. Those letters of Werther help in telling about his life, his finding of love and losing it in a village known as Wahlheim, whose people captivate him with simple and straightforward ways. A third person is also present in the story, who continuously narrates and explains various parts of the story. Werther meets Charlotte in the village. She is a pretty young girl and daughter of a land steward, who is looking for her brothers and sisters after their mother’s death. Werther knows that Charlotte is already engaged to Albert, a man eleven years older than her, but still he falls in love with her (Goethe,and Hulse n.p.).
In spite of the pain caused to him, Werther develops a close association with Charlotte and Albert. Werther’s life takes a painful turn when he leaves Wahlheim. He tries his best to forget Charlotte by immersing himself in a lot of work, but it is of no use. He faces awkwardness, when he goes to see a friend and finds a gathering of aristocrats. In that gathering, he is not liked by anyone, so he is said to leave. He comes back to Wahlheim, and found an increase in his sufferings. His passion for Charlotte turns into a destructive obsession, partly due to the marriage of Charlotte with Albert. Every day of his life is a kind of torture reminding him that Charlotte is married. However, she asks Werther not to meet her so commonly, and that decision is, on one side, to help her friend getting out of that painful condition and, on the other side, in respect of her husband (Goethe,and Hulse n.p.).
In that painful condition, Werther finds that the problem could be solved if one of the members of the triangle, i.e. Werther, Charlotte, or Albert, dies. Werther does not want to harm anyone, so he starts thinking about taking his life. After writing a goodbye letter, Werther borrows pistols of Albert and shoots in the head as he has lost his reason for living, but his life ends after about twelve hours. He is buried under a tree, which is frequently mentioned in his letters. Albert or Charlotte does not attend the funeral, nor do any clergy come to the funeral (Goethe,and Hulse n.p.).
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was born in 1749 in Frankfurt, a city in Germany. His father, Johann Kaspar Goethe, was an Imperial Councillor. He directed junior Goethe’s early education. Goethe learned Latin, Greek, Italian, and French in very early years of life. In order to fulfill the hopes of his father, he studied Law at Leipzig in 1765, where he gained popularity in theatrical circles. He found himself in love with Anne Catharina Schoenkopf in 1766. In Strassburg in 1770, he talked with Johann Gottfried Herder, who was one of the promoters and supporters of the Sturm und Drang (“storm and stress”) movement (Jensen, iep.utm.edu). This was a Romantic movement in German literature representing individual subjectivity and extreme levels of emotions along with aesthetic movements.
Goethe worked as a literary person. He got a copy of the book written on the life of a noble highwayman from a war and turned that biography into an interesting dramatic piece known as Götz von Berlichingen in 1773. His next work was Die Leiden des jungen Werther (1774) that was a hugely famous book. Although, the book got a huge success but due to the essentially nonexistent copyright laws, Goethe was unable to get much financial success. He died in 1832 in Weimar. He was buried in Fürstengruft of the Historischer Friedhof in Weimar along with his friend Schiller (Jensen, iep.utm.edu).
Commentary on the Book
This romantic novel has been presented in a poetic manner. The story may force the reader to think about the love poetry of Goethe’s time. Moreover, the reader may start thinking about the glorification of a heart breaking issue, i.e. suicide for love or lost love, which has been presented in many of the works of that romantic period. Werther’s love with Charlotte has been presented in such a language that is full of sensuous descriptions of nature, personal reflections, and detailed presentations of sufferings.
The storyline of the book was a kind of situations taken from the real lives of his associations with Charlotte Buff and Johann Christian Kestner, and the suicidal attempt of Karl Wilhelm Jerusalem, one of the Goethe’s friends. This book illustrated Sturm und Drang’s mindset by showing the issues of importance of emotion as compared to reason and disdain (Jensen, iep.utm.edu). It is also thought that the character of Werther in the book helped in igniting the Sturm und Drang movement.
Themes in the Book
Some of the important themes of the book are class, family, happiness, language, weather, subjectivity, and suicide. In the book, Werther has talked about his relationship with peasant class in Wahlheim. He considers the simple life of peasants as beautifully poetic, and shows that the simplicity can only be shown by the people from lower class. The book also showed the people of high class and the humiliation of Werther by those people, whom he considers smarter and talented. Classes were among the most important reasons for the return of Werther back to Wahlheim. Family is also an important theme in the book as shown by the relationship of Werther with her mother, which was not a good one. Werther needs a family, and in search of a perfect family, he reaches Charlotte. Charlotte attracted him as she was an extremely caring mother-figure for her siblings. Moreover, she is a thoughtful and smart woman having strong principles.
Happiness and sadness are also important themes of the book. Werther has much more to say about happiness but his opinion was that the source of happiness can become the source of misery. This was shown in some important parts of the life of Werther as, for example, he feels happy with Charlotte but he is sad as Charlotte is not the part of his life, and he feels happiness with Fraeulein von B but his attachment with Fraeulein embarrass him in the party. The story also shows that the life of Werther also results in the spread of sadness to his friends.
Limitations of language are also among the themes of the book. In some parts of the book, Werther is unable to show his expressions. For example, he is unable to illustrate the country lad’s affection for the widow in a letter (Goethe,and Hulse 9). In the later part of the book, he also mentions that he does not like to use dashes. This complex issue of using language to work on the limits of language was also an important part of Romanticism.
Goethe has also discussed weather in the book. He has placed weather, especially stormy weather, and Werther together in many situations. He also showed the mood of Werther in an interesting way as, for example, sometimes Werther is stormy in a positive way as, for example, while dancing with Charlotte, and sometimes his mood is stormy in a negative way such as during suicidal tendencies. This shows that the outer world mostly shows the world within, and these worlds influence each other.
Subjectivity is also an important theme of the book that is also a key part of youthful novel by Goethe. In the book, Werther studies himself, tries to know himself, writes about his use of language, and tells about his thoughts. Almost everything in the book focuses on the exploration for the self. While talking about himself, Werther also mentions suicide, which is also among the themes of the book. In fact, whenever Werther thinks of death, he thinks of his own death.
Works Cited
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, and M. Hulse. The Sorrows of Young Werther. Penguin Classics, 2006. Print.
Jensen, A. K. " Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749—1832)". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The University of Tennessee at Martin, n.d. Web. 25 Jul. 2016. <http://www.iep.utm.edu/goethe/>.
