A comprehensive account of Goethe's relationship to Arabian culture, mediated by his interest in certain poets and texts and by his highly nuanced attitude toward Islam. Abundant evidence bears witness to Johann Wolfgang Goethe's lifelong predilection for the literature, religion, and culture of ancient Arabia. Scholars have hardly yet touched upon Goethe's relationship to Arabic literature. His remarkable West-oestlicher Divan suggested that his interest in the "Orient" was limited to the Persian poet Hafez, his chief model for the collection, and to the culture of Persia. Yet significant aspects of this work and others stem from pre-Islamic and Islamic traditions of Arabian literature. This study examines comprehensively Goethe's relationship to Arabian culture, mediated primarily by his interest in certain poets and texts and by his highly nuanced attitude toward Muhammad, the Qur'an, and Islam. Katharina Mommsen has explored exhaustively Goethe's opinions about Arab poets and their sources, the numerous traces of Arabic poetry that entered his works, and thegrounds for his ambivalent affinity for Islam and its Prophet. Extensive textual evidence reveals how throughout his life Goethe's temperament determined his interest in particular Arabian poets and was in turn modulated by them.The study also opens new perspectives on Goethe's biography, especially in the early nineteenth century when he was writing the Divan. Katharina Mommsen's studies of Goethe, including Goethe und die Moallakat, Goethe und 1001 Nacht, and numerous articles on Goethe and Islam, are recognized internationally. She is Professor Emerita of German at Stanford University. Michael M. Metzger is Professor Emeritus of German at the University at Buffalo.
Reviews
Goethe and the Poets of Arabia [is] Mommsen's magnum opus . . . . now rendered into fine, readable and accurate English by Michael M. Metzger. . . . [T]he study's greatest value lies . . . in its analytical contribution -- one that is still fresh and pertinent twenty-five years after the original publication in German. -- James Hodkinson * GERMAN QUARTERLY *
[T]his remains a book that -- despite (or because of) the specificity of its focus, and in the light of world politics post-2001 and of growing Islamophobia, not least in Germany itself -- has a significant contribution to make, over and beyond the narrow world of Germanistik, to intercultural awareness and understanding. -- Paul Bishop * JOURNAL OF EUROPEAN STUDIES *
This English translation of Mommsen's exhaustive study, published in German in 1988, brings her multifaceted treatment of the influence of Arabian literature on Goethe's works to a wide audience. In the hands of its excellent translator, the text offers a wealth of material . . . . This is an important contribution on a fascinating subject. * CHOICE *



Book Information
ISBN 9781571139085
Author Katharina Mommsen
Format Hardback
Page Count 508
Imprint Camden House Inc
Publisher Boydell & Brewer Ltd
Weight(grams) 1g