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Elective Affinities opens with a discussion between Eduard and Charlotte about whether they will invite his friend, and then her ward, to stay with them. And a strange discussion it is. More “Goethe weirdness”? Similar to the mason, I don’t know how much to take the way characters address each other in this novel [...] There are a good deal more-serious things I plan to write about during Elective Affinities week, and this might have been a better Friday post, but since I’m tired I’ll use the foundation stone chapter now instead. Ha, the “foundation stone chapter”—I bet I fooled you into thinking it was some episode of ultimate [...] Elective Affinities (Die Wahlverwandtschaften), Goethe’s 1809 novel, is the story of Eduard and Charlotte, a middle-aged couple who have recently married, finding themselves, each widowed, unexpectedly able to fulfill their youthful dream of romance together. Not long after getting together, finding it simply irresistible to do so, they introduce new, volatile elements into their [...] Atoms bouncing back and forth amid the ether, Elemental bits of all earth’s matter, Attract, repel, and sometimes come together With a bond that’s hard to shake or shatter Unless a rival element appears To peel off half a once-strong compound. Chemical specifics would bore you to tears, But it’s these elective affinities by [...] There are a number of titles in the Art of the Novella series that I expect to enjoy, that are by authors I like, that I’m sure I will be happy to have read. But there are a few I’ve been specifically looking forward to, and Heinrich von Kleist’s The Duel was one of [...] I wanted to post today about Hans Fallada’s Every Man Dies Alone, much-recommended to and finally read by me. But damn. What a hell of a story. Next week I should be going to a Fallada-related event, so perhaps I will have more to say then, but for now, just two brief notes. First, [...] I read The Sorrows of Young Werther as part of my long-lingering (malingering?) epistolary literature project, and in this respect it was rather on the disappointing side. The novel is, like Evelina, not really epistolary. That is to say, I’d argue it doesn’t really gain much from the structure. The bulk of the novel [...] The problem with being a trendsetter is that the more successful you are, the less original you’ll seem. Thus is the trouble with The Sorrows of Young Werther, at least for me. Goethe’s influence was so great, and I’ve read so many influenced by him, that Werther seems almost derivative. He so epitomizes the [...] |
My Personal Canon (ongoing project) |
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