This new title may be of interest to colleagues:
Charlotte Lee, The Very Late Goethe: Self-Consciousness and the Art of Ageing (Oxford: Legenda, 2014).
ISBN: 978-1-909662-12-4
Charlotte Lee's new study explores the distinguishing feature of Goethe's last works: their self-consciousness, their preoccupation both with the business of writing and with personal development. Lee argues that Goethe’s last poems and autobiographical writings, together with "Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre" and "Faust II", form a separate stratum within the period traditionally known as his 'Spätwerk'. These very late texts allude subtly to earlier moments from Goethe’s own literary output. Yet they also fashion those memories into writing which is strikingly fresh and new - even though, or perhaps because, he himself is old. This book illuminates the unique perspective of a major writer nearing the end of a long and extraordinarily creative life.
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