Decoding Goethe and His Age

af Matthias Goertz

The proverbial "red thread" that runs through Goethe's oeuvre comprises his personal relationships-with men and boys. They provide the impetus and energy, the fabric and pattern for each and every one of his major works. His writing entails a continuous process of re-iterating, re-living, re-evaluating, re-contextualising his personal experiences, thereby eternalising it-and with it, himself. Goethe is the monument of a universal force he chiselled into words.