of being appointed at the Court of Augustus the Second, where, with
their love of magnificence, they desired to find a laureate who would
impart warmth and grace to their festivities, and immortalize a
transitory pomp. Von König was more self-controlled and more fortunate;
he filled this post with dignity and success.
In all sovereign states the material for poetry begins with the highest
social ranks, and the _Review Camp at Mühlberg_ was, perhaps, the
first worthy subject of provincial, if not of national importance which
presented itself to a poet. Two kings saluting one another in the
presence of a great host, their whole court and military state around
them, well-appointed troops, a sham-fight, _fêtes_ of all kinds,--here
was plenty to captivate the senses, and matter enough and to spare for
descriptive poetry.
This subject, indeed, suffered from an inner defect, in that it was
only pomp and show, from which no real action could result. None except
the very highest were involved, and even if this had not been the case,
the poet could not render any one conspicuous lest he should offend
the others. He had to consult the _Court and State Calendar_, and the
delineation of the persons was therefore not particularly exciting;
nay, even his contemporaries reproached him with having described the
horses better than the men. But should not the fact that he showed
his art as soon as a fitting subject presented itself redound to his
credit? The main difficulty, too, seems soon to have become apparent to
him--for the poem never advanced beyond the first canto.
As a result of discussions, examples, and my own reflection, I came
to see that the first step towards escape from the wishy-washy,
long-winded, empty epoch could be taken only by definiteness,
precision, and brevity. In the style which had hitherto prevailed,
it was impossible to distinguish the commonplace from what was
better, since a uniform insipidity prevailed on all hands. Authors
had already tried to escape from this widespread disease, with more
or less success. Haller and Ramler were inclined to compression by
nature; Lessing and Wieland were led to it by reflection. The former
became by degrees quite epigrammatic in his poems, terse in _Minna_,
laconic in _Emilia Galotti_,--it was not till later that he returned
to that serene _naïveté_ which becomes him so well in _Nathan_.
Wieland, who had been occasionally prolix in _Agathon_, _Don Sylvio_,
and the _Comic Tales_, became wonderfully condensed and precise, as
well as exceedingly graceful, in _Musarion_ and _Idris_. Klopstock,
in the first cantos of the _Messiah_, is not without diffuseness; in
his _Odes_ and other minor poems he appears concise, as also in his
tragedies. By his emulation of the ancients, especially Tacitus, he
was constantly forced into narrower limits, so that at last he became
obscure and unpleasing. Gerstenberg, a rare but eccentric genius, also
concentrated his powers; one feels his merit, but on the whole he gives
little pleasure. Gleim, by nature diffuse and easy-going, was scarcely
once concise in his war-songs. Ramler was properly more of a critic
than a poet. He began to collect what the Germans had accomplished in
lyric poetry. He discovered that scarcely one poem entirely satisfied
him; he was obliged to omit, rearrange, and alter, so that the things
might assume some sort of form. By this means he made himself almost as
many enemies as there are poets and amateurs, since every one, properly
speaking, recognizes himself only in his defects; and the public takes
greater interest in a faulty individuality than in what is produced or
amended in accordance with a universal law of taste. Rhythm was still
in its cradle, and no one knew of a method to shorten its childhood.
Poetical prose was gaining ground. Gessner and Klopstock found many
imitators; others, again, still put in a plea for metre, and translated
this prose into intelligible rhythms. But even these emended versions
gave nobody satisfaction; for they were obliged to omit and add, and
the prose original always passed for the better of the two. But in all
these attempts, the greater the conciseness aimed at, the more possible
is it to criticize them, since whatever is significant when presented
in a condensed form, in the end admits of definite comparison. Another
result was the simultaneous appearance of a number of truly poetical
forms; for while attempting to reproduce solely whatever was essential
in any one subject, it was necessary to do justice to every subject
chosen for treatment, and hence, though none did it consciously, the
modes of representation were multiplied; though some were grotesque
enough, and many an experiment proved unsuccessful.
Without question, Wieland possessed the finest natural gifts of all.
He had developed early in those ideal regions in which youth loves
to linger; but when so-called experience, contact with the world and
women, spoilt his delight in those realms, he turned to the actual, and
derived pleasure for himself and others from the conflict between the
two worlds, where, in light encounters, half in earnest, half in jest,
his talent found fullest scope. How many of his brilliant productions
appeared during my student days! _Musarion_ had the greatest effect
upon me, and I can yet remember the place and the very spot where I
looked at the first proof-sheet, which Oeser showed me. It was here
that I seemed to see antiquity living anew before me. Everything that
is plastic in Wieland’s genius showed itself here in the highest
perfection; and since the Timon-like hero Phanias, after being
condemned to unhappy abstinence, is finally reconciled to his mistress
and to the world, we may be content to live through the misanthropic
epoch with him. For the rest, we were not sorry to recognize in these
works a cheerful aversion to exalted sentiments, which are apt to be
wrongly applied to life, and then frequently fall under the suspicion
of fanaticism. We pardoned the author for pursuing with ridicule what
we held to be true and venerable, the more readily, as he thereby
showed that he was unable to disregard it.
What a miserable reception was accorded such efforts by the criticism
of the time may be seen from the first volumes of the _Universal German
Library_. Honorable mention is made there of the _Comic Tales_, but
there is no trace of any insight into the character of the literary
species. The reviewer, like every one at that time, had formed
his taste on examples. He never takes into consideration that in
criticizing such parodistical works, it is necessary first of all to
have the noble, beautiful original before one’s eyes, in order to see
whether the parodist has really discovered in it a weak and comical
side, whether he has borrowed anything from it, or whether, under the
pretense of imitation, he has given us an excellent invention of his
own. Of all this there is not a word, but isolated passages in the
poems are praised or blamed. The reviewer, as he himself confesses, has
marked so much that pleased him, that he cannot quote it all in print.
When they go so far as to greet the exceedingly meritorious translation
of Shakespeare with the exclamation: “By rights, a man like Shakespeare
should not have been translated at all!” it will be understood, without
further remark, how immeasurably the _Universal German Library_ was
behindhand in matters of taste, and that young people, animated by true
feelings, had to look about them for other guiding stars.
The subject-matter which in this manner more or less determined the
form was sought by the Germans in the most varied quarters. They had
handled few national subjects, or none at all. Schlegel’s _Hermann_
only pointed the way. The idyllic tendency had immense vogue. The
want of distinctive character in Gessner, with all his gracefulness
and childlike sincerity, made every one think himself capable of the
like. In the same manner, those poems which were intended to portray
a foreign nationality were founded merely on a common humanity, as,
for instance, the _Jewish Pastoral Poems_, all those on patriarchal
subjects, and any others based on the Old Testament. Bodmer’s
_Noachide_ was a perfect type of the watery deluge that swelled high
around the German Parnassus, and abated but slowly. Anacreontic
dallyings likewise made it possible for numberless mediocre writers
to meander aimlessly in a vague prolixity. The precision of Horace
compelled the Germans, though but slowly, to conform to him. Neither
did the burlesques, modeled, for the most part, on Pope’s _Rape of the
Lock_, succeed in inaugurating better times.
Yet I must here mention a delusion, which was taken as seriously
as it appears ridiculous on closer inspection. The Germans had now
an adequate historical knowledge of all the kinds of poetry in
which the various nations had excelled. This assignment of poetry
to its respective pigeon-holes--a process in reality fatal to its
true spirit--had been accomplished with approximate completeness by
Gottsched in his _Critical Art of Poetry_, and at the same time he
had shown that in all the divisions were to be found excellent works
by German poets. And so it went on. Every year the collection became
more considerable, but every year one work ousted some other from the
place in which it had hitherto shone. We now possessed, if not Homers,
yet Virgils and Miltons; if not a Pindar, yet a Horace; of Theocrituses
there was no lack; and thus they soothed themselves by comparisons from
abroad, whilst the mass of poetical works constantly increased, so that
at last it was possible to make comparisons at home.
With the cultivation of the German language and style in every
department, the power of criticism also increased; but while the
reviews then published of works upon religious and ethical as well
as medical subjects were admirable, the critiques of poems, and of
whatever else relates to _belles lettres_, will be found, if not
pitiful, at least very feeble. This holds good of the _Literary
Epistles_ and the _Universal German Library_, as well as of the
_Library of Belles Lettres_, and might easily be verified by notable
instances.
However great the confusion of these varied efforts, the only thing to
be done by any one who contemplated producing anything original, and
was not content to take the words and phrases out of the mouths of his
predecessors, was to search unremittingly for some subject-matter for
treatment. Here, too, we were greatly misled. People were constantly
repeating a saying of Kleist’s, who had replied playfully, with humor
and truth, to those who took him to task on account of his frequently
lonely walks: “that he was not idle at such times--he was hunting for
images.” This simile was very suitable for a nobleman and soldier, for
in it he contrasted himself with men of his own rank, who never missed
an opportunity of going out, with their guns on their shoulders, to
shoot hares and partridges. Accordingly we find in Kleist’s poems many
such individual images, happily seized, although not always happily
elaborated, which remind us pleasantly of nature. But now we, too, were
admonished quite seriously to go out hunting for images, and in the
end to some slight purpose, although Apel’s Garden, the Cake Gardens,
the Rosental, Gohlis, Raschwitz and Konnewitz, were the oddest ground
in which to beat up poetical game. And yet I was often induced from
this motive to contrive that my walk should be solitary. But few either
beautiful or sublime objects met the eye of the beholder, and in the
truly splendid Rosental the gnats in summer made all gentle thoughts
impossible, so by dint of unwearied, persevering endeavor, I became
extremely attentive to the small life of nature (I should like to use
this word after the analogy of “still life”). Since the charming little
incidents to be observed within this circle are but unimportant in
themselves, I accustomed myself to see in them a significance, tending
now towards the symbolical and now towards the allegorical, according
as intuition, feeling, or reflection predominated.
Whilst I was playing the part of shepherd on the Pleisse, and was
childishly absorbed in such tender subjects, always choosing such only
as I could easily recapture and lock in my heart, greater and more
important themes had long before been provided for German poets.
It was Frederick the Great and the events of the Seven Years’ War
which first gave to German literature a real and noble vitality. All
national poetry cannot fail to be insipid, or inevitably becomes so,
if it is not based on the man who stands first among men, upon the
experiences which come to the nations and their leaders, when both
stand together as one man. Kings should be represented in the midst of
warfare and danger, for there they are made to appear the highest, just
because the fate of the lowest depends upon them and is shared by them.
In this way they become far more interesting than the gods themselves,
who, when they have decided the destinies of men, do not share them.
In this sense every nation that wishes to count for anything ought to
possess an epic, though not necessarily in the form of an epic poem.
The war-songs first sung by Gleim deserve their high place in German
poetry, because they were the outcome of and contemporary with the
events they celebrate; and furthermore, because the felicitous form,
suggestive of a combatant’s utterance in the thick of the fray,
impresses us with its absolute effectiveness.
Ramler sings in different but dignified strains the exploits of his
king. All his poems are thoughtful, and fill our minds with great and
elevating subjects, and on that account alone possess an indestructible
value.
For the significance of the subject treated of is the Alpha and
Omega of art. Of course, no one will deny that genius, or cultivated
artistic talent, can by its method of treatment make anything out of
anything, and render the most refractory subject amenable. But on close
inspection the result is rather an artistic feat than a work of art,
which latter should be based on a fitting subject, so that in the end
the skill, the care, the diligence of the artist’s treatment only
brings out the dignity of the subject in greater attractiveness and
splendor.
Prussians, and with them Protestant Germany, therefore gained a
treasure-trove for their literature, which was lacking to the other
party, who have not been able to repair the deficiency by subsequent
efforts. In the high idea which they cherished of their King, the
Prussian writers first found inspiration, and fostered it all the more
zealously because he in whose name they did everything would have
nothing whatever to say to them. French civilization had been widely
introduced into Prussia at an earlier date by the French colony, and
again later by the King’s preference for French culture and French
financial methods. The effect of this French influence was to rouse the
Germans to antagonism and resistance--a result decidedly beneficial in
its operation. Equally fortunate for the development of literature was
Frederick’s antipathy to German. They did everything to attract the
King’s attention, not indeed to be honored, but only to be noticed by
him; yet they did it in German fashion, from inner conviction; they
did what they held to be right, and desired and wished that the King
should recognize and prize this as right. That did not and could not
happen; for how can it be expected that a king, who wishes to live and
enjoy himself intellectually, should waste his years waiting to see
what he thinks barbarous developed and rendered enjoyable too late? In
matters of trade and manufacture, it is true, he pressed upon himself,
but especially upon his people, very mediocre substitutes instead of
excellent foreign wares; but in this department of life everything is
perfected more rapidly, and it does not take a man’s life-time to bring
such things to maturity.
But I must here, first of all, make honorable mention of one work, the
most genuine product of the Seven Years’ War, altogether North German
in its national sentiment; it is the first dramatic work founded upon
important events of specific contemporary value, and therefore produced
an incalculable effect--_Minna von Barnhelm_. Lessing, who, unlike
Klopstock and Gleim, was fond of laying aside his personal dignity,
because he was confident that he could resume it at any moment,
delighted in a dissipated, worldly life and the society of taverns, as
he always needed some strong external excitement to counterbalance his
exuberant intellectual activity; and for this reason also he had joined
the suite of General Tauentzien. It is easy to see how this drama was
generated betwixt war and peace, hatred and affection. It was this
production which successfully opened to the literary and middle-class
world, in which poetic art had hitherto moved, a view into a higher,
more significant world.
The hostile relations in which Prussians and Saxons had stood towards
each other during this war, could not be removed by its termination.
The Saxon now felt for the first time the whole bitterness of the
wounds which the upstart Prussian had inflicted upon him. Political
peace could not immediately reëstablish a peace between their hearts.
But the establishment of this peace was represented symbolically in
Lessing’s drama. The grace and amiability of the Saxon ladies conquer
the worth, the dignity, and the stubbornness of the Prussians, and, in
the principal as well as in the subordinate characters, a happy union
of bizarre and contradictory elements is artistically represented.
If I have caused my readers some bewilderment by these cursory and
desultory remarks on German literature, I have succeeded in giving
them a conception of the chaotic condition of my poor brain at a time
when, in the conflict of two epochs so important for the national
literature, so much that was new crowded in upon me before I could come
to terms with the old, so much that was old still maintained its hold
upon me, though I already believed I might with good reason renounce it
altogether.
FOOTNOTES:
[12] About 1765-68.
EXTRACTS FROM GOETHE’S CONVERSATIONS WITH ECKERMANN
EXTRACTS FROM THE CONVERSATIONS WITH ECKERMANN
(1822-32)
_The Universality of Poetry_
Within the last few days I have read many and various things;
especially a Chinese novel, which occupies me still, and seems to me
very remarkable. The Chinese think, act, and feel almost exactly like
ourselves; and we soon find that we are perfectly like them, excepting
that all they do is more clear, more pure and decorous than with us.
With them all is orderly, simple, without great passion or poetic
flight; and there is a strong resemblance to my _Hermann and Dorothea_,
as well as to the English novels of Richardson. They differ from us,
however, inasmuch as with them external nature is always associated
with human figures. You always hear the goldfish splashing in the
pond, the birds are always singing on the bough, the day is always
serene and sunny, the night is always clear. There is much talk about
the moon, but it does not alter the landscape, its light is conceived
to be as bright as day itself; and the interior of the houses is as
neat and elegant as their pictures. For instance, “I heard the lovely
girls laughing, and when I got a sight of them, they were sitting on
cane chairs.” There you have, at once, the prettiest situation; for
cane chairs are necessarily associated with the greatest lightness
and elegance. Then there is an infinite number of legends which are
constantly introduced into the narrative, and are applied almost
like proverbs; as, for instance, one of a girl, who was so light and
graceful on her feet that she could balance herself on a flower without
breaking it; and then another, of a young man so virtuous and brave
that in his thirtieth year he had the honor to talk with the Emperor;
then there is another of two lovers who showed such great purity
during a long acquaintance that when they were on one occasion obliged
to pass the night in the same chamber, they occupied the time with
conversation, and did not approach one another.
And in the same way, there are innumerable other legends, all turning
upon what is moral and proper. It is by this severe moderation in
everything that the Chinese Empire has sustained itself for thousands
of years, and will endure hereafter.
I am more and more convinced that poetry is the universal possession
of mankind, revealing itself everywhere, and at all times, in hundreds
and hundreds of men. One makes it a little better than another, and
swims on the surface a little longer than another--that is all. Herr
von Matthisson must not think he is the man, nor must I think that I
am the man; but each must say to himself that the gift of poetry is by
no means so very rare, and that nobody need think very much of himself
because he has written a good poem.
But, really, we Germans are very likely to fall too easily into this
pedantic conceit, when we do not look beyond the narrow circle which
surrounds us. I therefore like to look about me in foreign nations, and
advise every one to do the same. National literature is now rather an
unmeaning term; the epoch of World Literature is at hand, and every
one must strive to hasten its approach. But, while we thus value what
is foreign, we must not bind ourselves to anything in particular, and
regard it as a model. We must not give this value to the Chinese, or
the Servian, or Calderon, or the Nibelungen; but if we really want a
pattern, we must always return to the ancient Greeks, in whose works
the beauty of mankind is constantly represented. All the rest we must
look at only historically, appropriating to ourselves what is good, so
far as it goes.
_Poetry and Patriotism_[13]
To write military songs, and sit in a room! That would have suited me!
To have written them in the bivouac, when the horses at the enemy’s
outposts are heard neighing at night, would have been well enough;
however, that was not my life and not my business, but that of Theodor
Körner. His war-songs suit him perfectly. But to me, who am not of a
warlike nature, and who have no warlike sense, war-songs would have
been a mask which would have fitted my face very badly.
I have never affected anything in my poetry. I have never uttered
anything which I have not experienced, and which has not urged me to
production. I have only composed love-songs when I have loved. How
could I write songs of hatred without hating! And, between ourselves,
I did not hate the French, although I thanked God that we were free
from them. How could I, to whom culture and barbarism are alone of
importance, hate a nation which is among the most cultivated of the
earth, and to which I owe so great a part of my own culture?
Altogether, national hatred is something peculiar. You will always
find it strongest and most violent where there is the lowest degree of
culture. But there is a degree where it vanishes altogether, and where
one stands to a certain extent _above_ nations, and feels the weal
or woe of a neighboring people, as if it had happened to one’s own.
This degree of culture was conformable to my nature, and I had become
strengthened in it long before I had reached my sixtieth year.
* * * * *
It is better for us moderns to say with Napoleon, “Politics are
Destiny.” But let us beware of saying, with our latest literati, that
politics are poetry, or a suitable subject for the poet. The English
poet Thomson wrote a very good poem on the Seasons, but a very bad one
on Liberty, and that not from want of poetry in the poet, but from want
of poetry in the subject.
If a poet would work politically, he must give himself up to a party;
and so soon as he does that he is lost as a poet; he must bid farewell
to his free spirit, his unbiased view, and draw over his ears the cap
of bigotry and blind hatred.