Goethe and Kleist

1. Goethe and Kleist David Pan Humanities Core Course Winter 2012

2. How do we judge Faust’s hesitation? FAUST. And you, what led you to this chamber? How deeply you are stirred! Your heart is heavy, and you feel so out of place. Wretched Faust! Who are you anyway? Am I moving in a magic haze? I came to seize the crassest pleasure, and now I dissolve in dreams of love! Are we the sports of every whim of the weather? And should she enter at this very moment, how you would rue your crude transgression! Then Faust would suddenly be very small and languish helpless at her feet. MEPPHISTOPHELES (entering). Quick, my friend! I see her coming down below. FAUST. Away from here, and never to return! (2717-2730, p. 235) Are Faust’s misgivings a sign of morality or of weakness? Faust seems to emphasize not just his guilt, but also his fear of weakness.

3. MEPHISTOPHELES. But come. Why all this fussing? You’re going to your sweetheart’s chamber and not at all to death and doom. FAUST. When in her arms, I need no joys of Heaven. The warmth I seek is burning in her breast. Do I not every moment feel her woe? Am I not the fugitive, the homeless roamer, an aimless, rootless, monstrous creature, roaring like a cataract from crag to crag, madly racing for the final precipice? And she along the banks with childlike, simple sense, there in her cabin on an alpine meadow, with all the homey enterprises encompassed by her tiny world. And I whom God abhors, I was not satisfied to seize the rocks, and crush them into pieces. It was her life, her peace I had to ruin. You, Satan, claimed this sacrifice! Help, Satan, help abridge the time of fear! What has to happen, let it happen now! Let her fate come crashing down on mine, let us both embrace perdition! (3345-65, pp. 301-303) Faust despairs because he knows that he is in continual movement… …and Margaret is someone in stasis. He blames himself for ruining her peace… …but chooses to continue on his path in spite of the destruction it will cause.

4. Goethe’s Faust I is: A comedy that affirms the values of the Walpurgis night. A tragedy because Margaret dies to affirm Christian values. A tragedy because Christian values create so much suffering for Margaret. A tragedy because Faust must continue to strive in spite of the violence he causes. None of the above.

5. Goethe’s Faust I : is written to be read seriously as an affirmation of an ethics of individual development is written to be read ironically as a critique of the ethics of individual development. Is written to be read according the tastes of the audience.

6. The Holy Roman Empire in 1789 consisted of hundreds of small kingdoms

7. Confederation of the Rhine under Napoleon (1806-1813) leads to consolidation of the German territories into 39 separate states

8. 19th century reactions condemned Goethe’s Faust for its anti-Christian tendencies. from Joseph von Eichendorff’s History of German Literature (1857) „...Goethe summed up the idea of humanity, not just as the cultivation of a sense of beauty through art, but the harmonious development of all human powers and capacities through life itself. He does not at all want to „follow an ideal“ but to allow his feelings to develop into capacities through struggle and play. [...] Clearly such an absolute focus on natural development makes all positive religion impossible, or at the very least superfluous (1052-53). Eichendorff sees Goethe’s Faust as central to the development of an individualist, humanist ethic. But this new ethic undermines religion. Eichendorff, Joseph von. Werke in sechs Bänden. Ed. Wolfgang Frühwald, Brigitte Schillbach and Hartwig Schultz. Frankfurt am Main: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1985-1993.

9. Unified Germany from 1871-1918

10. Beginning with German unification in 1871, critics began to see Faust as a model for German identity. Gustav von Loeper (1871) Loeper describes Faust’s guilt as part of his “greatness.” „Faust‘s true guilt and at the same time his true greatness lies in the struggle against the limits of human nature“ (XIV). Kuno Fischer (1878) „Faust‘s pleasure lies in the fruit of his labor, the view upon the great and blessed sphere of influence that he has created and upon the land that he has wrung from the elements, settled, and transformed into a human world and into an arena for striving generations after his own image“ (3:55-56, emphasis in original). Fischer sees Faust’s ideal of striving as the basis of activity for future generations. Loeper, Gustav. Goethes Sämtliche Werke. Vol. 13. Ed. Gustav von Loeper. Berlin: Hempel, 1871. Fischer, Kuno. Goethe’s Faust. Ueber die Entstehung und Composition des Gedichts. Stuttgart: Cotta, 1878. Cited in Karl Robert Mandelkow, Goethe im Urteil seiner Kritiker : Dokumente zur Wirkungsgeschichte Goethes in Deutschland. 4 vols. Munich: Beck, 1989.

11. The individualist ethic of Goethe’s Faust reaches the peak of its influence amongst established Goethe scholars in the Nazi period. Hermann August Korff Professor, University of Leipzig (1925-1954) Visiting Professor, Harvard University (1934) Visiting Professor, Columbia University (1938) “The contrast between good and evil is not thereby dissolved. Faust feels deeply what in an elementary sense is good and what is evil. But though he always participates in the two as he participates in the play of pleasure and pain, elementary morality does not have final power over him. It becomes a preserved moment within a more total ideal that has a hyper-moral character because morality is only one value next to other values and is no longer the highest value.” “For that which is placed above morality is the personality, whose fulfillment is the true goal of such a life.” “Great personalities consume the smaller ones. That is the law of nature. And their unethical behavior only consists in the way in which they must obey their natural law without allowing themselves to be hindered by their still existing moral affects.” (161-63) Morality is subordinated to the personality of the individual. What seems unethical is actually the individual’s adherence to a natural law without allowing moral feelings to get in the way. Korff, Hermann August. Faustischer Glaube: Versuch über das Problem humaner Lebenshaltung. Leipzig: J. J. Weber, 1938. My translation.

12. Nazi Goethe critics praise Faust. “Faust is the ingenious man who cannot be content with having and possessing either material or spiritual possessions. In this man there lives a drive to become a genius of the world and of the deed. The paltry contentment and the merely pleasurable that are the essence of the philistine are foreign to him, at least to the truly Faustian man. […] Yet, we must express this more clearly and more powerfully: here in the Faustian man there lives a passionate will that surges from the primal depths and does not shy away from any means of fulfilling the numerous tasks with which life confronts him – even to the point of allying himself with the devil!” (12). Schott promotes a focus on the world and deed. Schott refers to the Faustian man as someone who should not shy away from devilish means for fulfilling his goals. Schott, Georg. Goethes Faust in heutiger Schau. Stuttgart: Tazzelwurm Verlag, 1940. My translation.

13. Goethe’s Faust I : is written to be read seriously as an affirmation of an ethics of individual development is written to be read ironically as a critique of the ethics of individual development. is written to be read according the tastes of the audience.

14. Haitian Revolution Heinrich von Kleist French in Germany • 1777 Heinrich von Kleist born • 1789 French Revolution • 1792 Kleist joins Prussian army • 1793 Participates in siege of Mainz • 1799 Leaves army to go to university • 1800 Leaves university. Engaged to Wilhelmine von Zenge. • 1802 Begins first literary works • 1807 Arrested by the French as a spy and imprisoned briefly in the Fort-de-Joux. • 1808 Writes plays and pamphlet texts against the French occupation. Goethe performs Kleist’s “Broken Jug” • 1811 Writes “The Betrothal in St. Domingo” • 1811 Commits suicide in Berlin. • By 1789, San Domingo accounts for 11 million pounds of France’s total export trade of 17 million pounds. (Total British colonial trade was 5 million pounds.) 500,000 black slaves and 30,000 whites. • 1789 French Revolution • 1791 Slave Revolt begins in St. Domingue • 1794 French abolish slavery in colonies • 1798 Toussait L’Ouverture defeats British • 1802 French land troops in St. Domingue and L’Ouuverture imprisoned in Fort-de-Joux and dies in 1803. • 1803 Dessalines defeats French troops near Cap Francais. • 1804 Dessalines declares independence of Haiti. • 1789 French Revolution • 1792 French occupy Mainz • 1793 Prussian troops retake Mainz. • 1806 Napoleon defeats the Prussians at Jena. Begin of French occupation. • 1809 Napoleon defeats the Austrians at Wagram. • 1813 Napoleon defeated at Leipzig • 1815 Napoleon defeated at Waterloo.

15. “The Betrothal in San Domingo”: • Defends the white perspective against the blacks • Defends the black perspective against the whites • Does not take sides in the conflict

16. Role of narrator On Monsieur Guillaume de Villeneuve’s plantation at Port-au-Prince in the French sector of the island of Santo Domingo there lived at the beginning of this century, at the time when the blacks were murdering the whites, a terrible old negro called Congo Hoango. Objective reporting Biased perspective

17. Description of Guillaume de Villeneuve’s kindnesses This man, who came originally form the Gold Coast of Africa, had seemed in his youth to be of a loyal and honest disposition, and having once saved his master’s life when they were sailing across to Cuba, he had been rewarded by the latter with innumerable favours and kindnesses. Not only did Monsieur de Villeneuve at once grant him his freedom, and on returning to Santo Domingo make him the gift of a house and home; a few years later, although this was contrary to local custom, he even appointed him as manager of his considerable estate, and since he did not want to re-marry provided him, in lieu of a wife, with an old mulatto woman called Babekan, who lived on the plantation and to whom through his first wife Congo Hoango was distantly related. Moreover, when the negro had reached the age of sixty he retired him on handsome pay and as a crowning act of generosity even made him a legatee under his will;

18. Description of Congo Hoango’s cruelty and yet all these proofs of gratitude failed to protect Monsieur de Villeneuve from the fury of this ferocious man. In the general frenzy of vindictive rage that flared up in all those plantations as a result of the reckless actions of the National Convention, Congo Hoango had been one of the first to seize his gun and, remembering only the tyranny that had snatched him from his native land, blew his master’s brains out. He set fire to the house in which Madame de Villeneuve had taken refuge with her three children and all the other white people in the settlement, laid waste the whole plantation to which the heirs, who lived in Port-au-Prince, could have made claim, and when every single building on the estate had been razed to the ground he assembled an armed band of negroes and began scouring the whole neighborhood, to help his bloodbrothers in their struggle against the whites. Sometimes he would ambush travellers who were making their way in armed groups across country; sometimes he would attack in broad daylight the settlements in which the planters had barricaded themselves, and would put every human being he found inside to the sword. Such indeed was his inhuman thirst for revenge that he even insisted on the elderly Babekan and her young daughter, a fifteen-year-old mestiza called Toni, taking part in this ferocious war by which he himself was feeling altogether rejuvenated: (232)

19. Declaration of the Rights of Man - 1789 Approved by the National Assembly of France, August 26, 1789 The representatives of the French people, organized as a National Assembly, believing that the ignorance, neglect, or contempt of the rights of man are the sole cause of public calamities and of the corruption of governments, have determined to set forth in a solemn declaration the natural, unalienable, and sacred rights of man, in order that this declaration, being constantly before all the members of the Social body, shall remind them continually of their rights and duties; in order that the acts of the legislative power, as well as those of the executive power, may be compared at any moment with the objects and purposes of all political institutions and may thus be more respected, and, lastly, in order that the grievances of the citizens, based hereafter upon simple and incontestable principles, shall tend to the maintenance of the constitution and redound to the happiness of all. Therefore the National Assembly recognizes and proclaims, in the presence and under the auspices of the Supreme Being, the following rights of man and of the citizen: Articles: 1.Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be founded only upon the general good. 2. The aim of all political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.

20. Decree of the National Convention of the 16th of Pluvidor, Year 2 of the French Republic, one and indivisible, Which abolishes Negro slavery in the colonies The National Convention declares that Negro slavery in all of the colonies is abolished; it further decrees that all men, regardless of color, who live in the colonies are French citizens and enjoy all rights guaranteed by the constitution. It delegates to the Committee of Public Health the task of reporting on the measures to be taken to assure the execution of this decree. February 4, 1794

21. White planters “do you mean to say that you yourself, who as the whole cast of your features shows are a mulatto and therefore of African origin, that both you and this charming mestiza who opened the door of the house to me, are condemned to the same fate as us Europeans?” (236-37) Mulatto planters Wealth Small whites Black slaves Social Status

22. The wretched man, who knew neither that the girl was sick nor what disease she suffering from, came to her room full of gratitude, thinking himself saved, and took her in his arms; but he had scarcely been half an hour in her bed caressing her and fondling her when she suddenly sat up with an expression of cold, savage fury and said: “I whom you have been kissing am infected with pestilence and dying of it: go now and give the yellow fever to all your kind!”‘ And as the old woman loudly proclaimed her abhorrence of such a deed, the officer asked Toni: ‘Could you ever do a thing like that?’ ‘No!’ said Toni, casting her eyes down in confusion. The stranger, laying his napkin on the table, declared that it was his deep inner conviction that no tyranny the whites had ever practiced could justify a treachery of such abominable vileness. ‘Heaven’s vengeance is disarmed by it,’ he exclaimed, rising passionately from his seat, ‘and the angels themselves, filled with revulsion by this overturning of all human and divine order, will take sides with those who are in the wrong and will support their cause!’ (242) Gustav’s story Toni’s confusion Gustav’s convictions

23. Gustav’s story about Marianne Congreve On the pretext that she was my accomplice, they dragged her instead of me to the scaffold. No sooner had this appalling news been conveyed to me than I emerged from my hiding-place into which I had fled, and hastened, pushing my way through the crowd, to the place of execution, where I shouted at the top of my voice: “Here I am, you inhuman monsters!” But she, already standing on the platform beside the guillotine, on being questioned by some of the judges who as ill-fortune would have it did not know me by sight, gave me one look which is indelibly imprinted on my soul, and then turned away, saying: “I have no idea who that man is!” And a few moments later, amid a roll of drums and a roar of voices, at the behest of those impatient butchers, the iron blade dropped and severed her head from her body. (246) Gustav’s critique of inhumanity Marianne’s denial of Gustav Marianne’s self-sacrifice

24. Toni defends Gustav against Babekan ‘What harm has this young man done to us? He is not even a Frenchman by birth, but a Swiss, as we have learned; so why should we fall on him like bandits and kill him and rob him? Do such grievances as we may have against the planters here exist in the part of the island from which he comes? Is it not, rather, quite obvious that he is an entirely noble-minded and honourable man who has in no way participated in the injustices committed by his race against the blacks?’ (249) Emphasizes Gustav is neutral Judges Gustav’s individual qualities

25. Bourgeois Family Drama • Friedrich Schiller • Intrigue and Love (1784) • Ferdinand, an aristocrat, and Luise Miller, a bourgeois seek to marry • Fathers are opposed to union • Ferdinand’s father forces Luise to write a love letter to another man so the Ferdinand will reject her • In despair over her disloyalty, Ferdinand poisons himself and Luise • Heinrich von Kleist • “The Betrothal in San Domingo” • The narrator and Gustav: • defend bourgeois qualities • criticize the blacks for having “aristocratic” vices • imagine the bond between Toni and Gustav as the basis for loyalty Bourgeois qualities: honesty, loyalty, pity Aristocratic vices: deceit, treachery, cruelty

26. “The Betrothal in San Domingo”: • Has a narrator who defends the white perspective against the blacks • Has a narrator who defends the black perspective against the whites • Has a narrator who does not take sides in the conflict

27. The narrator in “The Betrothal in San Domingo”: • Should be considered seriously. • Should be considered ironically.