1749–1832 · Frankfurt am Main, Germany · also known as Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe is Germany’s Shakespeare — poet, novelist, playwright, scientist and statesman. His short novel The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774), about a young man destroyed by unrequited love, made him famous across Europe at 24. He spent most of his life in Weimar as a minister at the ducal court, and worked for some sixty years on Faust, the scholar who bargains with the devil Mephistopheles — Part One appeared in 1808, Part Two in 1832, the year he died. Germany’s cultural institute, the Goethe-Institut, is named after him.
Begin with The Sorrows of Young Werther.
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Friedrich Schiller · Brothers Grimm · E. T. A. Hoffmann · Theodor Fontane · Thomas Mann · Franz Kafka · Hermann Hesse · Erich Maria Remarque
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe is Germany’s Shakespeare — poet, novelist, playwright, scientist and statesman. His short novel The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774), about a young man destroyed by unrequited love, made him famous across Europe at 24.
Faust is usually considered Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s best-known work, followed by The Sorrows of Young Werther, Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship, Elective Affinities.
Most readers start with The Sorrows of Young Werther.
Both refer to the same writer.
Yes — 2 of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s books are free to read online in Pagine, the free e-reader and reading tracker.