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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 April 2024
Rapid developments in science, technology and means of communication offer man possibilities for dialogue that up until now have been undreamed-of. It must be undeniably admitted, however, that we live in a world dominated by fear of the other, fanaticism, racism and every kind of conflict. This is why we have thought it useful to reactualize the Goethian conceptions of universal literature and otherness, conceptions that, coming from the generosity of a humanist and appreciator of the other, could help us contribute to the discussion on the problems of interculturality that give rise to more and more animated controversies.
* This study is the revised and corrected version of the second part of a conference held April 14, 1984 at the University of Heidelberg on “The Other in German Philosophy and Literature.”
1 R. Etiemble, "Faut-il réviser la notion de Weltliteratur?" IV Acta AILC Congress, La Haye/Paris, 1966, pp. 5-16, gives a detailed criticism of the libraries of universal literature. In a German version, different from the present study, I have devoted some pages to the study of anthologies, encyclopedias and interpretation of Weltliteratur in German. Cf. "Goethes Theorie der Alterität und die Idee der Weltliteratur", Gegenwart als kulturelles Erbe, collective work, Bernard Thum, ed., Munich, ludicium Verlag, 1985. Our research brought out the almost Eurocentric, to say nothing of Germanocentric, nature of these works.
2 "Weltliteratur, as we have seen, is the equivalent of Weltliteratur," writes François Jost (p. 20). Cf. "Littérature comparée et littérature universelle," Orbis litterarum, XXVII, 1972, pp. 13-27 (if not otherwise indicated it is my underlining. Here it is Jost who underlines).
3 Goethe, Hamburger Ausgabe (HA), XII, p. 352.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid.
6 Letter to Streckfuss, January 27, 1827, ibid. p. 362.
7 Letter to Iken, February 23, 1826, Goethe-Jahrbuch, 33, 1971.
8 HA, XII, p. 364.
9 Ibid., p. 363.
10 Ibid.
11 Goethe-Jahrbuch, op. cit., p. XVI.
12 HA, XII, p. 364.
13 Ibid., p. 352.
14 Ibid., p. 353.
15 Goethe-Jahrbuch, op. cit. p. XVI.
16 Ibid.
17 Eckermann, op. cit., p. 158 (Goethe's underlining.) For the original quotations see Johann Peter Eckermann, Gespräche mit Goethe, Munich, dtv, 1976, p. 229.
18 Ibid., p. 156 et seq. (Gespräche, p. 227).
19 Ibid., p. 158 (Gespräche, p. 228).
20 Ibid., (Gespräche, p. 228 et seq.)
21 See Fritz Strich, Goethe und die Weltliteratur, Berne, Francke, 1946; Hans Reiss, Goethe und die Tradition, Frankfurt, Athenäum, 1972.
22 HA, XII, p. 352 et seq.
23 Ibid., p. 353.
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid., p. 364.
26 Eckermann, op. cit., p. 182 (Gespräche, p. 262).
27 Ibid.
28 Goethe-Jahrbuch, op. cit. p. XVI.
29 Goethe, Berliner Ausgabe, Vol. 18, p. 427 et seq.
30 HA, XII, p. 363.
31 HA, Briefe 4, p. 277.
32 HA, XII, p. 363.
33 Ibid.
34 Ibid., p. 353.
35 See S.H. Abdel-Rahim, Goethe und der Islam, Augsburg, Werner Blasaditsch, 1969; H. Djait, L'Europe et l'Islam, Paris, Seuil, 1978; K. Mommsen, Goethe und 1001 Nacht, Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1981; M. Rodinson, La fascination de l'Islam, Paris, Maspéro, 1980; E. Said, L'Orientalisme, Paris, Seuil 1980.
36 Goethe, Divan, op. cit., p. 430 (HA, II, p. 255).
37 Ibid., p. 431, (HA, II, p. 255).
38 Ibid., (HA, II, p. 255).
39 Ibid., (HA, II, p. 255) On the subject of the relations of Goethe with France, see Goethe et l'esprit français, Acta of Colloque international de Strasbourg, 23-27, April 1957; Hippolyte L'oiseau, Goethe et la France, Paris/Neuchâtel, Victor Attinger, 1930.
40 Goethe, Divan, op. cit., p. 431 (HA, II, 256).
41 Ibid., (HA, II, p. 256).
42 Ibid., (HA, II, p. 256).
43 Ibid., p. 431 et seq. (HA, II, p. 256).
44 Ibid., p. 432 (HA, II, p. 256).
45 In his treatise entitled Réponse à la question: qu'est-ce l'"Aufklärung"? Kant writes, "It is the emancipation of man from his own minority, for which he is himself responsible." See Kant, Werke, Wilhelm Weischede, ed., Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Vol. 9, p. 53, 1975 (Kant's underlining).
46 See Théorie de la littérature. Textes des formalistes russes, Tzvetan Todorov, ed., Paris, Seuil, 1965.
47 See Bernard Dort, Lectures de Brecht, Paris, Seuil, 1950; Reinhold Grimm, "Verfremdung: Beiträge zu Ursprung und Wesen eines Begriffs." Rev. Litt. Comp., 35, 1961, pp. 207-236.
48 See Fawzi Boubia, "Die Verfremdung der Verfremdung," Informationen. Deutsch als Fremdsprache, 4, 1986.
49 Goethe, Divan, op. cit., p. 432 (HA, II, p. 256).
50 Ibid. (HA, II, p. 257).
51 Ibid. (HA, II, p. 256).
52 Ibid. (HA, II, p. 257).
53 Goethe, Tag- und Jahreshefte, HA, X, p. 266.
54 Here is this essential text in its entirety: "If we have dared to proclaim a universal European literature, indeed, a general universal literature, it does not mean that the different nations must be acquainted with each other and their respective productions since, in this sense, universal literature has already existed for a long time, continues to exist and more or less renew itself. No! It is rather a question that men of letters full of life and aspiration become acquainted with each other and feel obligated through their leanings and their civic sense to act socially." HA, XII, p. 363.
55 Ibid.
56 Goethe, Über Kunst und Altertum, II, 2 (1820). Cf. Reiss, op. cit., p. 18.
57 Eckermann, op. cit., January 29, 1826, p. 158 (Gespräche, p. 172).
58 On the subject of Goethe and romanticism see Helmut Brackert, "Die ‘Bildungsstufe der Nation' und der Begriff der Weltliteratur: Ein Beispiel Goethescher Mittelalterrezeption," in Reiss, op. cit. pp. 84-101; Hans Joachim Schrimpf, "Goethes Begriff der Weltliteratur" in Nationalismus in Germanistik und Dichtung, Benno von Wiese/Rudolf Henss, eds., Berlin, Erich Schmidt, 1967, pp. 20-217.
59 HA, XII, p. 286.
60 Ibid.
61 Letter to Reinhard, June 22, 1808, HA briefe 4, p. 77.
62 Ibid., p. 78.
63 Briefe to Eichstädt, October 31, 1807, HA, Briefe 3, p. 58.
64 Eckermann, op. cit. p. 536 et seq. (Gespräche, p. 767).
65 HA, XII, p. 286.
