It is this genre, characteristic of literature of the 18th century, that Goethe chooses for his work; the action takes place in one of the small German towns at the end of the 18th century. The novel consists of two parts - these are letters from Werther himself and additions to them under the heading “From the publisher to the reader.” Werther's letters are addressed to his friend Wilhelm, in them the author strives not so much to describe the events of his life, but to convey his feelings that the world around him evokes in him.

Werther, a young man from a poor family, educated, inclined towards painting and poetry, settles in a small town to be alone. He enjoys nature, communicates with ordinary people, reads his beloved Homer, and draws. At a country youth ball, he meets Charlotte S. and falls madly in love with her. Lotta, as the girl’s close friends call her, is the eldest daughter of the princely ruler; there are nine children in their family. Their mother died, and Charlotte, despite her youth, managed to replace her with her brothers and sisters. She is not only visually attractive, but also has independent judgment. Already on the first day of meeting Werther and Lotte, a similarity of tastes is revealed, they easily understand each other.

From now on, the young man spends most of his time every day in the amtman's house, which is an hour's walk from the city. Together with Lotte, he visits a sick pastor and goes to look after a sick lady in the city. Every minute spent near her gives Werther pleasure. But the young man’s love is doomed to suffering from the very beginning, because Lotte has a fiancé, Albert, who has gone to get a respectable position.

Albert arrives, and although he treats Werther kindly and delicately hides the manifestations of his feelings for Lotte, the young man in love is jealous of her for him. Albert is reserved, reasonable, he considers Werther an extraordinary person and forgives him for his restless disposition. For Werther, the presence of a third person during meetings with Charlotte is difficult; he falls either into unbridled joy or into gloomy moods.

One day, in order to get a little distraction, Werther is going on horseback to the mountains and asks Albert to lend him pistols for the road. Albert agrees, but warns that they are not loaded. Werther takes one pistol and puts it to his forehead. This harmless joke turns into a serious argument between young people about a person, his passions and reason. Werther tells a story about a girl who was abandoned by her lover and threw herself into the river, because without him life for her had lost all meaning. Albert considers this act “stupid”; he condemns a person who, carried away by passions, loses the ability to reason. Werther, on the contrary, is disgusted by excessive rationality.

For his birthday, Werther receives a package as a gift from Albert: it contains a bow from Lotte’s dress, in which he saw her for the first time. The young man suffers, he understands that he needs to get down to business and leave, but he keeps putting off the moment of separation. On the eve of his departure, he comes to Lotte. They go to their favorite gazebo in the garden. Werther says nothing about the upcoming separation, but the girl, as if anticipating it, starts talking about death and what will follow. She remembers her mother, the last minutes before parting with her. Worried by her story, Werther nevertheless finds the strength to leave Lotte.

The young man leaves for another city, he becomes an official under the envoy. The envoy is picky, pedantic and stupid, but Werther made friends with Count von K. and tries to brighten up his loneliness in conversations with him. In this town, as it turns out, class prejudices are very strong, and the young man is constantly pointed out about his origin.

Werther meets the girl B., who vaguely reminds him of the incomparable Charlotte. He often talks with her about his former life, including telling her about Lotte. The surrounding society annoys Werther, and his relationship with the envoy is getting worse. The matter ends with the envoy complaining about him to the minister, who, being a delicate person, writes a letter to the young man in which he reprimands him for being excessively touchy and tries to direct his extravagant ideas in the direction where they will find the right application.

Werther temporarily comes to terms with his position, but then a “trouble” occurs that forces him to leave the service and the city. He was visiting Count von K., stayed too long, and at that time guests began to arrive. In this town, it was not customary for a low-class person to appear in noble society. Werther did not immediately realize what was happening, besides, when he saw a girl he knew, B., he started talking to her, and only when everyone began to look sideways at him, and his interlocutor could hardly carry on a conversation, the young man hastily left. The next day, gossip spread throughout the city that Count von K. had kicked Werther out of his house. Not wanting to wait until he is asked to leave the service, the young man submits his resignation and leaves.

First, Werther goes to his native place and indulges in sweet childhood memories, then he accepts the prince’s invitation and goes to his domain, but here he feels out of place. Finally, unable to bear the separation any longer, he returns to the city where Charlotte lives. During this time she became Albert's wife. Young people are happy. Werther's appearance brings discord into their family life. Lotte sympathizes with the young man in love, but she is also unable to see his torment. Werther rushes about, he often dreams of falling asleep and never waking up, or he wants to commit a sin and then atone for it.

One day, while walking around the outskirts of the town, Werther meets the crazy Heinrich, who is collecting a bouquet of flowers for his beloved. Later he learns that Heinrich was a scribe for Lotte’s father, fell in love with a girl, and love drove him crazy. Werther feels that the image of Lotte is haunting him and he does not have the strength to put an end to his suffering. At this point, the young man’s letters end, and we learn about his future fate from the publisher.

Love for Lotte makes Werther unbearable for those around him. On the other hand, the decision to leave the world gradually becomes stronger in the young man’s soul, because he is unable to simply leave his beloved. One day he finds Lotte sorting through gifts for her family on the eve of Christmas. She turns to him with a request to come to them next time no earlier than Christmas Eve. For Werther, this means that he is deprived of the last joy in life. Nevertheless, the next day he still goes to Charlotte, and together they read an excerpt from Werther’s translation of Ossian’s songs. In a fit of unclear feelings, the young man loses control of himself and approaches Lotte, for which she asks him to leave her.

Returning home, Werther puts his affairs in order, writes a farewell letter to his beloved, and sends a servant with a note to Albert for pistols. At exactly midnight, a shot is heard in Werther's room. In the morning, the servant finds a young man, still breathing, on the floor, the doctor comes, but it is too late. Albert and Lotte are having a hard time with Werther's death. They bury him not far from the city, in the place that he chose for himself.

From the very first pages of the novel, the reader finds himself drawn into the inner world of the hero, imbued with the deepest sympathy for him and becomes a confidant of his experiences. Werther's letters to a friend are perceived as if they were written to us, to each of us.

The Sorrows of Young Werther is Goethe's most intimate work. We, of course, understand that the hero is a fictitious person, but behind him Goethe himself is seen; It is clear to us that we need to experience this ourselves, otherwise the author could not express with such feeling what is happening in the hero’s soul.

Unwittingly identifying Goethe with Werther, almost every reader feels that the hero’s experiences are also characteristic of us. Goethe's other heroes are interesting and admirable, but we always look at them more or less from the outside. Werther enters our souls as a part of ourselves.

Already a brief warning from the “publisher” of the letters encourages the reader to respect the mind and heart of the hero and shed tears over his fate, and then the hero’s letters immediately follow, enchanting with their sincere tone. The author of these letters, without looking back, fully reveals his heart. Step by step he tells how he arrived in the small town; we learn about the confusion that controls his soul after some complicated love story, when he fled from two girls who were carried away by him, we hear about his thirst for loneliness; Together with him we admire the surrounding nature, then a fateful moment comes in his life - he meets the daughter of a local official, Lotte, and falls in love with her.

In a few strokes, Werther conveys the appearance of a lovely girl and, most importantly, speaks with such expressiveness about his feelings for her that the lines of the book awaken in every reader the memory of his own greatest love in his youth.

Werther is not destined to find reciprocity. Lotte is engaged, her fiancé Albert is a worthy young man. True, he is of a different make-up than Werther, lacking his subtle sensitivity, not so dreamy, but he is practical and has both feet firmly on the ground.

Realizing the hopelessness of his passion, Werther leaves the city, becomes an official at the diplomatic mission of a small state, but does not find consolation in the service, which for him is associated not only with meaningless work, but also with a humiliating position, for he, as a burgher, is a man of the lower class, a stranger in an aristocratic environment, although in intelligence and talent he surpasses those who are higher than him in social status.

Deciding to return to the town, he finds Lotte already married to Albert. His passion does not go out because of this, and also more increases and becomes painful. Continuing to meet with his beloved, who is friendly towards him, Werther one day, in a fit of feeling, embraces her; Although she warmly responds to his kiss, reason forces her to come to her senses, and she forbids him to see her. In despair, Werther commits suicide by shooting himself with a pistol he borrowed from Albert.

If for most of the story the reader learns about what is happening from Werther’s letters, then towards the end the story is told on behalf of the unnamed “publisher” of the letters, the hero. Here the presentation becomes drier, but at times even the “publisher” is unable to resist emotional expressions when it comes to the feelings that worried Werther.

In his autobiography, Goethe gave reason to think that The Sorrows of Young Werther was written by him under the direct impression of his unsuccessful love for Charlotte Buff, whom he met shortly after his arrival in Wetzlar in 1772. The love for Lotte lasted only about four months, from June to September this year. By his own admission, he did not hide his passion, but the behavior of Charlotte and her fiancé convinced him that “this adventure must be ended,” and he “decided to leave of his own free will” before he was driven away by “unbearable circumstances” (3, 468).

Goethe said in his memoirs that at one time he was tossed around with thoughts of suicide, but then “threw aside his stupid hypochondria and decided that he had to live. In order to carry out this intention with sufficient cheerfulness, I, however, needed to cope with a certain poetic task: to express all my feelings, thoughts and dreams regarding the mentioned by no means unimportant subject (that is, suicide. - A.A.). For this purpose, I brought together all the elements that had been haunting me for several years now, and tried to imagine with complete clarity the cases that oppressed and worried me more than others; but all of them stubbornly did not take shape: I lacked an event - a plot in which I could embody them. Suddenly I heard about the death of Jerusalem, and immediately after the first news came the most accurate and detailed description of the fatal event. At that very moment, “Werther’s” plan matured; the constituent parts of the whole rushed with all sides in order to merge into a dense mass... It was all the more important for me to hold on to the rare prize, to clearly see before me a work with such significant and varied content, to develop it in all parts because I again found myself in a very annoying and even more hopeless situation than in Wetzlar, position" (3, 494).

This confession reveals how the plan for “The Sorrows of Young Werther” came together. Everything in the novel is based on true facts, on Goethe’s personal experiences, on the history of Jerusalem, on observations of others. The “diversity” that Goethe speaks of does not mean external events - there are very few of them in the novel - but feelings, moods, interests - in a word, the spiritual world of the hero, the image of which forms the main content of The Sorrows of Young Werther.

In Goethe's story, it looks as if the failed love for Charlotte, the love for another woman, and the suicide of Jerusalem followed directly after each other. Meanwhile, everything was somewhat different.

Goethe separated from Charlotte and her husband, Kästner, in September 1772. That same fall, he met the family of the writer Sophie Laroche and was inflamed with tender feelings for her seventeen-year-old daughter Maximiliana (her relatives called her Maxe). Jerusalem committed suicide on October 30. In January 1774, Maxe was married to the merchant Brentano. The marriage turned out to be unhappy. Goethe often visited her house, her husband did not like it very much, and he expelled his wife’s admirer.

It is firmly established that Goethe began writing the novel in February 1774 and completed it four weeks later. Thus, a year and a half passed after the death of Jerusalem before Goethe began to write his work, and the story of Maximilian occurred just at the beginning of 1774; then the novel was created.

The question of the chronology of events would not be worth touching on in order to correct an inaccuracy in Goethe's story. Something else is more important. Despite the apparent direct correspondence between Goethe and his hero, in fact, “The Sorrows of Young Werther” is by no means an autobiographical story or a confession, although the novel often gives just such an impression.

Like a true artist, Goethe filtered his life experience, combined two love stories into one, endowed the hero with some of his own traits and experiences, but introduced into his character also traits unusual for himself, taking them from Jerusalem.

The external outline of events is close to how the relationship between Charlotte Buff and Goethe developed, but it is no coincidence that both she and Kästner were offended and irritated when they read “The Sorrows of Young Werther”: it seemed to them that Goethe had distorted the relationship between the three of them; these people, like many readers, saw in the novel simply a statement of what happened in reality. Goethe had difficulty reassuring them with a promise to correct the “inaccuracies” in the second edition. But he did not soon take up this work. Only in 1787, thirteen years later and twelve years after he had settled in Weimar, did Goethe change something in the novel, but, of course, not so much for the sake of his friends as because much had changed in himself and he wanted to make changes in style, composition and characterization. The deliberate irregularity of speech characteristic of the “sturm und drang” style has disappeared from the language of the novel; Albert's characterization was softened; introduced the story of an employee who committed murder out of jealousy. But, perhaps, the main thing was that in a number of touches Goethe made the narrative more objective, whereas in the first version almost everything was shown as Werther saw it.

The second option became canonical, since Goethe included it in his collected works. Since then, readers have become acquainted with Goethe's first novel not quite in the form in which it literally shocked his contemporaries. But the changes were not so radical as to deprive the novel of the passion, spontaneity, and sense of youth that permeate this most lyrical of Goethe’s novels. We are considering the novel in the form in which Goethe left it for the judgment of generations in his years of maturity.

The power of love rising to the very top of passion, a tender, vulnerable soul, admiration for nature, a subtle sense of beauty - these traits of Werther are universal, and they made him one of the most beloved heroes of world literature. But not only them.

Werther is close to many people because of his suffering, his dissatisfaction. Especially young people, because they, like him, experience failures extremely acutely and hard and suffer when life does not live up to their expectations.

If in this respect Werther is like many others, then in other respects he is a hero of the type that was especially close to Goethe himself. Although Werther is in many ways similar to the intelligent young burghers of the 1770s, at the same time he is endowed with a completely Goethean quality. Werther has a world-encompassing soul. He deeply feels his connection with the universe. He is equally close to the heavens with their powerful elements, to an ant crawling in the grass, and even to a stone lying on the road. This is his worldview, rooted in the very depths of his soul. Werther senses world life with every fiber and tip of his nerves.

He is a man of feeling, he has his own religion, and in this he is like Goethe himself, who from a young age embodied his changing worldview in the myths created by his imagination. Werther believes in God, but this is not at all the God to whom they pray in churches. His god is the invisible, but constantly felt by him, soul of the world. Werther's belief is close to Goethe's pantheism, but does not completely merge with it and cannot merge, for Goethe not only felt the world, but also sought to know it. Werther is the most complete embodiment of that time, which was called the era of sensitivity.

By means of his art, Goethe made the story of Werther’s love and torment merge with the life of all nature. Although the dates of Werther’s letters show that two years pass from the meeting with Lotte to death, Goethe compressed the time of action and did it this way: the meeting with Lotte takes place in the spring, the happiest time of Werther’s love is summer; The most painful thing for him begins in the fall; he wrote his last suicide letter to Lotte on December 21. Thus, like the mythical heroes of primitive times, Werther’s fate reflects the flourishing and dying that occurs in nature.

The landscapes in the novel constantly hint that Werther's fate goes beyond the usual story of failed love. It is imbued with symbolism, and the broad universal background of his personal drama gives it a truly tragic character.

Before our eyes, the complex process of the hero’s mental life is developing. How much joy, love of life, enjoyment of the beauty and perfection of the universe is heard in the letter of May 10, amazing in its lyricism, in which Werther describes how he, lying in the tall grass, observes thousands of all kinds of blades of grass, worms and midges; at this moment he feels “the closeness of the almighty, who created us in his own image, the spirit of the all-loving, who destined us to soar in eternal bliss...” (6, 10).

But then Werther begins to realize the hopelessness of his love for Lotte, and his worldview changes. On August 18, he writes: “My powerful and ardent love for living nature, which filled me with such bliss, turning the entire world around me into paradise, has now become my torment... the spectacle of endless life has turned for me into the abyss of an ever-open grave” (6 , 43, 44).

One December night was filled with a harbinger of disaster, when, due to a thaw, the river overflowed its banks and flooded the very valley that Werther so inspiredly described in a letter on May 10: “It’s scary to watch from above from the cliff how the rapid streams seethe in the moonlight, flooding everything.” around; groves, fields and meadows and the entire vast valley - a continuous sea, raging under the roar of the wind!.. Standing over the abyss, I stretched out my arms, and was drawn down! Down! Oh, what a bliss it is to throw my torment, my suffering down there!”

The deity, which had previously seemed so good to Werther, giving only joy, was transformed in his eyes. “My father, unknown to me! Father, who previously filled my entire soul and now has turned his face away from me! Call me to you!” (6, 75) - exclaims Werther, for whom heaven has become an abode

Thus, Werther becomes the first herald of world sorrow in Europe, long before a significant part of romantic literature was imbued with it.

The reason for Werther's torment and deep dissatisfaction with life is not only in unhappy love. Trying to recover from it, he decides to try his hand at public service, but, as a burgher, he can only be given a modest post that does not correspond to his abilities. Formally, his job is purely secretarial, but in fact he must think and draw up business papers for his boss. The envoy with whom Werther is a pedantic fool “is always dissatisfied with himself, and therefore you can’t please him with anything. My work is progressing, and I write straight away. And he is able to return the paper to me and say: “Not bad, but look again - you can always find a better expression and a more correct turn of phrase” (6, 52). He himself, of course, is not capable of anything, but he demands perfection from his subordinates.

The irritated young man was about to resign, but the minister dissuaded and encouraged him. He, according to Werther, paid “tribute to the youthful enthusiasm visible in my extravagant ideas about useful activity, about influencing others and interfering in important matters,” but suggested that these ideas should be “softened and directed along the path where they will find the right one for themselves.” application and will have a fruitful effect!” (6, 56 - 57). Even having moderated his ardor, Werther still could not accomplish anything. An incident occurred that put an end to his unsuccessful start to service.

Count K., who provided him with patronage, invited him to his place for dinner. It was a high honor for a humble official and burgher. He should have retired after dinner so as not to disturb the aristocratic society that had gathered to pass the time, but he did not. Then the count found himself forced to tell him about this, that is, simply put, to expel Werther, at the same time, however, asking him to excuse “our wild morals” (b, 58). The rumor about the incident instantly spread throughout the city, and Werther realized that they were saying about him: “This is what arrogance leads to when people boast of their insignificant minds and believe that everything is allowed to them” (6, 59).

Insulted, Werther leaves the service and leaves for his native place. He remembers his youth there, and he is overcome by sad thoughts: “Then, in blissful ignorance, I was rushing into a world unfamiliar to me, where I hoped to find so much food for my heart, so many joys, to satiate and pacify my hungry, restless soul. Now, my friend,” he writes, “I have returned from a distant world with a heavy burden of unfulfilled hopes and destroyed intentions” (6, 61).

Werther's grief is caused not only by unsuccessful love, but also by the fact that both in his personal life and in his public life, the paths were closed to him. Werther's drama is social. Such was the fate of a whole generation of intelligent young people from the burgher environment, who found no use for their abilities and knowledge, and were forced to eke out a miserable existence as tutors, home teachers, rural pastors, and petty officials.

In the second edition of the novel, the text of which is now usually published, the “publisher”, after Werther’s letter of December 14, limited himself to a brief conclusion: “The decision to leave the world became increasingly stronger in Werther’s soul at that time, which was facilitated by various circumstances” (b, 83).

In the first edition this was stated clearly and clearly: “He could not forget the insult inflicted on him during his stay at the embassy. He rarely remembered her, but when something happened that even remotely reminded him of her, one could feel that his honor was still hurt and that this incident aroused in him an aversion to all kinds of business and political activity. Then he completely indulged in that amazing sensitivity and thoughtfulness that we know from his letters; he was overcome by endless suffering, which killed in him the last remnants of the ability to act. Since nothing could change in his relationship with the beautiful and beloved creature, whose peace he had disturbed, and he fruitlessly wasted his forces, for the use of which there was neither purpose nor desire, this finally pushed him to a terrible act.

It can be assumed that, as a Weimar minister, Goethe considered it tactless to preserve this place in the novel, but we will not insist on such an explanation. Something else is important. Even without such an unequivocal explanation of the reasons for Werther’s tragedy, it remained a social tragedy. The opening letters of the second part require no comment to understand their acute political meaning. Although Goethe showed only individual features of reality, this was enough for his contemporaries to feel the author’s hostility to the feudal system.

In general, we would extremely narrow the social meaning of the novel, considering that the social sound in it is inherent only in the scenes of Werther’s participation in state affairs. For readers, the hero’s experiences had more than just personal meaning. The uninhibitedness of his feelings, their strength, love for nature - all this revealed in him a man of a new type, an admirer of the teachings of Rousseau, who revolutionized all the thinking of the world of his time. Readers of the late 18th century did not need to name the source of Werther's ideas. The first generation of readers of the novel, at least a significant part of it, knew “The New Heloise” (1761) by Rousseau, which tells a story that is in many ways similar to Goethe’s novel; readers also knew the treatise of the Genevan thinker “Discourse on the origin and foundations of inequality between people” (1754). The ideas of these books were in the air, and Goethe did not need to emphasize the connection of the hero and his own with the advanced ideas of the time.

Well written about This is Thomas Mann: “It is not an easy task to analyze the state of mind that underlay the European civilization of that era. From a historical point of view, this was a pre-storm state, a premonition of the French Revolution clearing the air; from a cultural and historical point of view, this was the era on which Rousseau left the stamp of his dreamy and rebellious spirit. Saturation with civilization, the emancipation of feeling, exciting the minds, the craving back to nature, to the natural man, attempts to break the shackles of an ossified culture, indignation at the conventions and narrowness of petty-bourgeois morality - all this together gave rise to an internal protest against what limited the free development of the individual, and fanatical, the unbridled thirst for life resulted] in a gravitation towards death. Melancholy, “satiation with the monotonous rhythm of life” came into use 1.

In this pre-revolutionary era, personal feelings and moods vaguely reflected deep dissatisfaction with the existing system. Werther's love suffering had no less social significance than his mocking and angry descriptions of aristocratic society. Even the desire for death and suicide sounded like a challenge to a society in which a thinking and feeling person had nothing to live with. That is why this seemingly purely German novel acquired no less ardent admirers in France, and among them, as is known, was the modest artillery officer Napoleon Bonaparte, who, by his own admission, read “The Sorrows of Young Werther” seven times.

The central conflict of the novel is embodied in the opposition between Werther and his happy rival. Their characters and concepts of life are completely different. In the first edition, Lotte's fiancé was depicted in darker colors; in the final text, Goethe softened his portrait, and this gave greater credibility not only to the image, but to the entire novel. Indeed, if Albert were the embodiment of spiritual dryness, how could Lotte love him? But even in a somewhat softened form, Albert remained an antagonist to Werther.

Werther cannot help but admit: “Albert fully deserves respect. His restraint contrasts sharply with my restless disposition, which I cannot hide. He is able to feel and understand what a treasure Lotta is. Apparently, he is not prone to gloomy moods...” (6, 36). “Undoubtedly, there is no one better than Albert in the world” (b, 38), Werther enthusiastically speaks of him, showing his characteristic extreme of judgment. However, he has a good reason for this. Albert does not prevent him from meeting Lotte; moreover, they exchange opinions about her in a friendly manner. He, according to Werther, “never overshadows my happiness with grumpy antics, but, on the contrary, surrounds me with cordial friendship and values ​​me more than anyone else in the world after Lotte!” (6, 38).

Such was the idyllic relationship between Kästner, Charlotte and Goethe according to the description found in Poetry and Truth (see 3, 457 - 459). Their correspondence indicates that Goethe and Kästner were close in views. Not so in the novel. Already in the quoted words of Werther, a cardinal difference in temperaments is noted. But they also differ in their views on life and - death!

Werther's letter dated August 18 details a serious conversation that took place between friends when Werther, asking to lend him pistols, jokingly put one of them to his temple; Albert warned that this was dangerous to do and wanted to add something. “However,” he said, and Werther remarks: “... I love him very much, until he takes up his “however.” It goes without saying that there are exceptions to every rule. But he is so conscientious that, having expressed some, in his opinion, reckless, untested general judgment, he will immediately bombard you with reservations, doubts, objections, until nothing remains of the essence of the matter” (6, 39).

However, in the dispute about suicide that arises between them, Albert adheres to a firm point of view: suicide is madness. Werther objects: “You have definitions ready for everything; sometimes it’s crazy, sometimes it’s smart, sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad!.. Have you delved into the internal reasons for this action? Can you trace with accuracy the course of events that led, should have led to it? If you took on this work, your judgments would not be so rash” (6, 39).

It is amazing how skillfully Goethe prepares the ending of the novel, posing the problem of suicide long before the hero comes to the idea of ​​dying. At the same time, there is so much hidden irony here in relation to critics and readers who will not notice what made Werther’s shot inevitable.

Albert is firmly convinced: “... some actions are always immoral, no matter what the motives for which they were committed” (6, 39). His moral concepts are dogmatic, despite the fact that he is a good person.

The mental process leading to suicide is characterized with great depth by Werther: “A person can endure joy, grief, pain only to a certain extent, and when this degree is exceeded, he dies... Look at a person with his closed inner world: how they act on impressions of what obsessive thoughts take root in him, until an ever-growing passion deprives him of all self-possession and leads him to destruction” (6, 41). What irony! Not yet knowing what will happen to him, Werther accurately anticipates his fate!

The controversy, however, reveals more than just differences in views on suicide. We are talking about the criteria for moral assessment of human behavior. Albert knows exactly what is good and what is bad. Werther rejects such morality. Human behavior is determined, in his opinion, by nature. “Human nature has a certain limit,” he declares. “...we consider it a fatal disease when the forces of human nature are partly exhausted, partly so strained that it is not possible to raise them and restore the normal course of life with some beneficial shake-up” (6, 41). The same applies to the spiritual sphere of a person: “It will be in vain for a cool, reasonable friend to analyze the condition of the unfortunate person, it will be in vain to admonish him! So a healthy person, standing at the bedside of a sick person, will not pour a drop of his strength into him” (b, 41). This is natural morality, morality that comes from human nature and from individuality. Moreover, as Werther states, “we have the right to judge in conscience only what we ourselves have felt” (b, 41).

What position does Lotte occupy between the two men who love her?

She is the embodiment of femininity. Even before becoming a mother, she already fully demonstrates the maternal instinct. She has a highly developed sense of duty, but not formal, but again natural. She is a daughter, mother, bride and will become a good wife not by virtue of moral requirements, but by the call of feeling.

Having learned about one suicide out of jealousy, Werther is amazed: “Love and fidelity - the best human feelings - led to violence and murder” (6, 79). Werther himself was also driven into a terrible state by this wonderful feeling.

Nothing like this, however, can happen to Lotte. She is characterized by restraint and moderation, and therefore she found in Alberta the person who will make her happy. At the same time, she has sincere sympathy for Werther. She would not be a woman if she were not flattered by Werther's worship. Her feeling is on that fine line when, under certain conditions, it could develop into something more. But it is precisely the innate, natural consciousness of duty that does not allow her to cross this line. Werther is dear to her because of their common perception of beauty, the poetry of his nature, and the fact that the children she cares for love him. She could have loved him like this forever, had he not tried to cross the line set by her.

Werther is all feeling, passion; Lotta is the embodiment of feeling, tempered by the consciousness of natural duty. Albert is a man of reason, adhering to the letter of moral precepts and the law.

The conflict of two attitudes towards life and morality between Werther and Albert at the beginning has, if you like, only theoretical significance. But it ceases to be an abstract dispute when the fate of a peasant who committed murder out of jealousy is decided. Werther “so understood the depth of his suffering, so sincerely justified him even in murder, so entered into his position that he firmly hoped to instill his feelings in others” (6, 80). Albert sharply objected to Werther and blamed him for taking a murderer under his protection, “then pointed out that in this way it would not take long to abolish all laws and undermine the foundations of the state...” (b, 80). Here it is clearly revealed that the apology of feeling by Rousseau and the figures of “Storm and Drang” had by no means only a psychological significance. Note that Werther rationally understood Albert’s arguments, and yet he had the feeling that by admitting and recognizing their correctness, “he would renounce his inner essence” (6, 80). From that moment on, Werther’s attitude towards Albert changed dramatically: “No matter how much I say and repeat to myself that He honest and kind - I can’t help it - he makes me sick to my stomach; I am unable to be fair” (6, 81).

There is, however, one more character in the novel who cannot be ignored. This is the “publisher” of Werther's letters. Who he is is unknown. Perhaps Werther's friend Wilhelm, to whom all the hero's letters are addressed. Perhaps another person to whom Wilhelm conveyed his friend’s heartfelt outpourings. It is not this that is important, but his attitude towards Werther. He maintains the strict objectivity of the narrator, reporting only the facts. But sometimes, when conveying Werther’s speeches, he reproduces the tonality inherent in the hero’s poetic nature.

The role of the “publisher” becomes especially important at the end of the story, when the events leading up to the death of the hero are recounted. From the “publisher” we also learn about Werther’s funeral.

Werther is Goethe's first hero who has two souls. The integrity of his nature is only apparent. From the very beginning, he senses both the ability to enjoy life and a deep-rooted melancholy. In one of his first letters, Werther writes to a friend: “It’s not for nothing that you have never met anything more changeable, more fickle than my heart... You have so many times had to endure the transitions of my mood from despondency to unbridled dreams, from tender sadness to destructive ardor!” (6, 10).

Werther has impulses that make him similar to Faust; he is depressing that “the creative and cognitive powers of man” are limited by “narrow limits” (6, 13), but along with the vague desire to break out of these limits, he has an even stronger desire to withdraw: “ I'm leaving for myself and open up a whole world!” (b, 13).

Observing himself, he makes a discovery that again reveals his inherent duality: “... how strong is the desire in a person to wander, to make new discoveries, how open spaces attract him; but along with this, there lives in us an internal craving for voluntary limitation, for rolling along the usual rut, without looking around” (b, 25).

Werther's nature is characterized by extremes, and he admits to Albert that it is much more pleasant for him to go beyond the generally accepted than to submit to the routine of everyday life. “Oh, you wise men! - exclaims Werther, resolutely shutting himself off from Albert's reasonable sobriety. - Passion! Intoxication! Insanity!.. I have been drunk more than once, in passions I have sometimes reached the brink of madness and I do not repent of either of them...” (b, 40).

In Albert's eyes, Werther's fury is weakness. But the stormy genius - and this is exactly how he appears at this moment - rejects such an accusation, not by chance citing a political argument: “If the people, groaning under the intolerable yoke of a tyrant, finally rebel and break their chains, will you really call them weak?” (6, 40).

The whole trouble, however, is that this is precisely what the German people do not do, and loners like Werther have to limit themselves to extravagant behavior in everyday life, causing the indignation of the bourgeoisie. Werther's tragedy is that the forces boiling within him are not put to use. Under the influence of unfavorable conditions, his consciousness becomes more and more painful. Werther often compares himself with people who get along quite well with the prevailing system of life. So is Albert. But Werther cannot live like this. Unhappy love aggravates his tendency to extremes, sharp transitions from one mental state to the opposite, changes his perception of the environment. There was a time when he “felt like a deity” (6, 44) in the midst of the lush abundance of nature, but now even the attempt to resurrect those inexpressible feelings that previously elevated his soul turns out to be painful and makes him doubly feel the horror of the situation.

Over time, Werther's letters increasingly reveal a violation of his mental balance. “My active forces have become disorganized, and I am in some kind of anxious apathy, I cannot sit idly by, but I cannot do anything. I no longer have either creative imagination or love for nature, and books disgust me” (6, 45). “I feel that fate is preparing severe trials for me” (6, 51). After the insult with on the part of the aristocrats: “Ah, I have grabbed a knife hundreds of times to ease my soul; They say that there is such a noble breed of horses that, by instinct, bite through their veins so that it is easier to breathe when they are too hot and driven. I, too, often want to open my veins and find eternal freedom” (6, 60). He complains of a painful emptiness in his chest, religion is unable to console him, he feels “driven, exhausted, uncontrollably sliding down” (b, 72) and even dares to compare his situation with the torment of the crucified Christ (b, 72).

Werther’s confessions are supported by the testimony of the “publisher”: “Melancholy and annoyance took root more and more deeply in Werther’s soul and, intertwining with each other, little by little took possession of his entire being. His mental balance was completely disrupted. Feverish excitement shook his entire body and had a destructive effect on him, leading him to complete exhaustion, with which he fought even more desperately than with all other adversities. Heart anxiety undermined all his other spiritual powers: liveliness, sharpness of mind; he became intolerable in society; his misfortune made him more unjust, the more unhappy he was” (b, 77). It is also reported “about his confusion and torment, about how, without knowing peace, he rushed from side to side, how disgusted he was with life...” (6, 81). Werther's suicide was the natural end of everything he had experienced; it was due to the peculiarities of his nature, in which personal drama and oppressed social position gave precedence to the painful beginning. At the end of the novel, one expressive detail once again emphasizes that Werther’s tragedy had not only psychological, but also social roots. "Coffin<Вертера>carried by artisans. None of the clergy accompanied him” (b, 102).

The novel of the young Goethe was misunderstood by many contemporaries. It is known to have caused several suicides. What was Goethe’s own attitude to the issue of suicide?

Goethe admitted that at one time he himself was possessed by the desire to commit suicide. He overcame this mood in a way that more than once rescued him in difficult moments of life: he gave poetic expression to what tormented him. Working on the novel helped Goethe overcome melancholy and gloomy thoughts.

But he was not driven only by personal experiences. As has already been said, Goethe captured the mentality that possessed many people of his generation, and very accurately explained the reason for the extraordinary success of The Sorrows of Young Werther. “The effect of my little book was great, one might even say enormous, mainly because it came at the right time. Just as a piece of smoldering tinder is enough to detonate a large mine, so here the explosion that occurred among the readers was so great that the young world itself had already undermined its foundations, and the shock was so great because everyone had accumulated an excess of explosive material. ..” (3, 498). Goethe also wrote about the “Werther” generation: “... tormented by unsatisfied passions, not receiving the slightest encouragement from outside to do any significant actions, seeing nothing before them except the hope of somehow holding out in the dragging, uninspired burgher life, the young people, in their gloomy arrogance, have become close to the idea of ​​giving up life if it gets too boring for them...” (3, 492).

Goethe himself, as we know, overcame this state of mind. He considered it an expression of “morbid youthful recklessness” (3, 492), although he perfectly understood how such a state of mind could arise. The novel was written with the aim of showing Werther's fate as a tragedy. The work quite expressively emphasizes the excruciating painful nature of the hero’s experiences. Goethe, however, did not consider it necessary to add instructive tirades to his novel; he rejected the moralizing of the enlighteners.

His novel was the highest artistic expression of the principle of characterization. Werther is a living human image, his personality is revealed comprehensively and with great psychological depth. The extremes of the hero's behavior are described with sufficient clarity.

Among those who did not fully understand the meaning of the novel was none other than Lessing himself, whom Goethe highly revered. Let us recall that when Werther shot himself, Lessing’s tragedy “Emilia Galotti” was found open on the table in his room (the detail was not invented by Goethe: this particular book was in Jerusalem’s room).

In Lessing's drama, the honest and virtuous Odoardo kills his daughter Emilia to prevent her from becoming the Duke's concubine, and then stabs her to death. myself.

It would seem that Lessing should have understood that there are situations when suicide becomes justified. But the great enlightener did not agree with the ending of the novel. “Thank you a thousand times for the pleasure you gave me by sending Goethe’s novel,” he wrote to a friend a month after the book’s publication. “I’m returning it a day early so that others can get the same pleasure as soon as possible.”

I am afraid, however, that such a passionate work may bring more evil than good; Don't you think that a cooling conclusion should be added to it? A couple of hints as to how Werther acquired such a bizarre character; it is necessary to warn other similar young men, whom nature has endowed with the same inclinations. Such people can easily believe that the one who evokes such great sympathy in us is right.” 1

Highly appreciating the merits of the novel, recognizing its great impressive power, Lessing had a limited understanding of the meaning of The Sorrows of Young Werther, seeing in the book only the tragedy of unhappy love. He, an educator full of fighting spirit, striving to arouse the activity of the people, wanted the hero not to fold his hands in powerlessness, and thus more did not impose them on himself, but would rebel against the existing system. “Do you think,” Lessing asked his friend meaningfully, “would some young Roman or Greek commit suicide?” So And for this reason? Of course not. They knew how to avoid the extremes of love, and in the time of Socrates, such a love frenzy, leading to a violation of the laws of nature, would hardly have been forgiven even for a girl. Such supposedly great, falsely noble originals are generated by our Christian culture, which is very sophisticated in turning bodily need into spiritual sublimity.” Lessing always condemned the Christian religion for the morality of submission it preached and gave preference to the citizenship and warlike spirit of antiquity. Therefore, in conclusion, he expressed a wish: “So, dear Goethe, we should give a final chapter, and the more cynical the better!” 2

There is no information whether Lessing's review reached Goethe. But the straightforward understanding of the novel and the identification of the hero’s moods with the views of the author became so widespread that Goethe considered it necessary to attach poems to the second printing of the novel that unambiguously expressed his negative attitude towards suicide. The first book was given an epigraph:

Everyone in love wants to love like that,

This is how a girl wants to be loved.

Oh! Why does the most holy impulse sharpen

Sorrow is the key and eternal darkness is approaching!

(I, 127. Translation by S. Solovyov)

The epigraph to the second part was frankly instructive:

Are you mourning him, darling?

Do you want to save a good name?

“Be a husband,” he whispers from the grave, “

Don't follow my path."

(I, 127. Translation by S. Solovyov)

Thus, regardless of whether Goethe knew Lessing's opinion, he too urged young people not to follow Werther's example and to be courageous.

However, when publishing the second edition of the novel in 1787, Goethe removed instructive epigraphs, hoping that readers were ripe for a correct understanding of the meaning of the work.

The sentimental novel in epistolary form was written in 1774. The work became the second literary success of the great German writer. Goethe's first success came after the drama "Götz von Berlichingen". The first edition of the novel instantly becomes a bestseller. A revised edition was published in the late 1780s.

To some extent, “The Sorrows of Young Werther” can be called an autobiographical novel: the writer spoke about his love for Charlotte Buff, whom he met in 1772. However, Werther’s beloved was not based on Charlotte Buff, but on Maximilian von Laroche, one of the writer’s acquaintances. The tragic ending of the novel was inspired by Goethe's death of his friend, who was in love with a married woman.

In psychology, the Werther syndrome or effect is usually called a wave of suicides committed for imitative purposes. A suicide described in popular literature, cinema, or widely covered in the media can trigger a wave of suicides. This phenomenon was first recorded after the publication of Goethe’s novel. The book was read in many European countries, after which some young people, imitating the hero of the novel, committed suicide. In many countries, authorities were forced to ban the distribution of the book.

The term “Werther effect” appeared only in the mid-1970s thanks to the American sociologist David Philipps, who studied the phenomenon. As in Goethe’s novel, those most susceptible to the effect are those who were in the same age group as the one whose “feat” was chosen to be imitated, that is, if the first suicide was an elderly person, his “followers” ​​will also be elderly people. The method of suicide will also be copied in most cases.

A young man named Werther, who comes from a poor family, wants to be alone and moves to a small town. Werther has a penchant for poetry and painting. He enjoys reading Homer, talking to the people of the city, and drawing. Once at a youth ball, Werther met Charlotte (Lotta) S., the daughter of a princely leader. Lotta, being the eldest, replaced her brothers and sisters' deceased mother. The girl had to grow up too early. That is why she is distinguished not only by her attractiveness, but also by her independence of judgment. Werther falls in love with Lotte on the very first day of their acquaintance. Young people have similar tastes and characters. From now on, Werther tries to spend every free minute with an unusual girl.

Unfortunately, the love of a sentimental young man is doomed to numerous sufferings. Charlotte already has a fiancé, Albert, who left the city for a short time to get a job. Returning, Albert learns that he has a rival. However, Lotte's fiancé turns out to be more reasonable than her suitor. He is not jealous of his bride for his new admirer, finding it quite natural that it is simply impossible not to fall in love with such a beautiful and intelligent girl as Charlotte. Werther begins to have attacks of jealousy and despair. Albert tries in every possible way to calm his opponent, reminding him that every action of a person must be reasonable, even if madness is dictated by passion.

On his birthday, Werther receives a gift from Lotte's fiancé. Albert sent him a bow from his bride's dress, in which Werther first saw her. The young man takes this as a hint that it is high time for him to leave the girl alone, and then goes to say goodbye to her. Werther again moves to another city, where he gets a job as an official under the envoy. The main character does not like life in a new place. Class prejudices are too strong in this city.

Seal of bad luck
Werther is constantly reminded of his ignoble origins, and his boss turns out to be overly picky. However, soon the young man makes new friends - Count von K. and the girl B., who is very similar to Charlotte. Werther talks a lot with his new friend, telling her about his love for Lotte. But soon the young man had to leave this city too.

Werther goes to his homeland, believing that it will be there that he will feel better. Not finding peace here either, he goes to the city where his beloved lives. Lotte and Albert had already gotten married by that time. Family happiness ends after Werther returns. The couple begins to quarrel. Charlotte sympathizes with the young man, but cannot help him. Werther increasingly begins to think about death. He does not want to live away from Lotte and at the same time cannot be near her. In the end, Werther writes a farewell letter and then takes his own life by shooting himself in his room. Charlotte and Albert are grieving their loss.

Characteristics

The main character of the novel is independent enough to receive a decent education, despite his low origin. He very easily finds a common language with people and a place in society. However, the young man definitely lacks common sense. Moreover, in one of his conversations with Albert, Werther argues that an excess of common sense is not needed at all.

All his life, the main character, being a dreamer and romantic, was in search of an ideal, which he found in Lotte. As it turns out, the ideal already belongs to someone. Werther does not want to put up with this. He chooses to die. Although she had many rare virtues, Charlotte was not perfect. It was made ideal by Werther himself, who needed the existence of a supernatural being.

Incomparable Charlotte

It is no coincidence that the author notes that Werther and Lotte are similar in their tastes and characters. However, there is one fundamental difference. Unlike Werther, Charlotte is less impulsive and more restrained. The girl's mind dominates her feelings. Lotte is engaged to Albert, and no passion can make the bride forget her promise to the groom.

Charlotte took on the role of mother of the family early, despite the fact that she did not yet have her own children. Responsibility for someone else's life made the girl more mature. Lotta knows in advance that she will have to answer for every action. She perceives Werther, rather, as a child, one of her brothers. Even if Charlotte had not had Albert in her life, she would hardly have accepted the advances of her ardent admirer. In her future life partner, Lotte is looking for stability, not boundless passion.

The ideal Charlotte has found for herself an equally ideal spouse: both belong to the upper strata of society, and both are distinguished by their composure and restraint. Albert's prudence does not allow him to fall into despair when meeting a potential opponent. He probably doesn't consider Werther a competitor. Albert is confident that his smart and prudent bride, like himself, will never exchange her groom for a crazy man who can so easily fall in love and do crazy things.

Despite everything, Albert is no stranger to sympathy and pity. He does not try to rudely remove Werther from his bride, hoping that the unfortunate rival, sooner or later, will come to his senses. The bow sent to Werther for his birthday becomes a hint that it is time to stop dreaming and take life as it is.

Composition of the novel

Goethe chose one of the most popular literary genres of the 18th century. The work was divided into 2 parts: letters from the main character (the main part) and additions to these letters, entitled “From the publisher to the reader” (thanks to the additions, readers become aware of Werther’s death). In the letters, the main character addresses his friend Wilhelm. The young man strives to talk not about the events of his life, but about the feelings associated with them.

5 (100%) 1 vote

The history of the creation of the novel “The Sorrows of Young Werther”

The tragic soil that nurtured The Sorrows of Young Werther was Wetzlar, the seat of the imperial court, where Goethe arrived in May 1772 at the request of his father, who dreamed of a brilliant legal career for his son. Having signed up as a practicing lawyer at the imperial court, Goethe did not look into the building of the court chamber. Instead, he visited the house of the amtman (that is, the manager of the vast economy of the Teutonic Order), where he was drawn by an ardent feeling for Charlotte, the eldest daughter of the owner, the bride of the secretary of the Hanoverian embassy, ​​Johann Christian Kesgner, with whom Goethe maintained friendly relations.

On September 11 of the same 1772, Goethe, suddenly and without saying goodbye to anyone, left Wetzlar, deciding to escape from the ambiguous situation in which he found himself. A sincere friend of Kesgner, he became interested in his bride, and she did not remain indifferent to him. Each of the three knows this - most clearly, perhaps, the sober and intelligent Kästner, who is already ready to return the word she gave to Charlotte. But Goethe, although in love, although mad, shied away from his friend’s generous sacrifice, which from him, Goethe, would have required a reciprocal sacrifice - a renunciation of absolute freedom, without which he, a stormy genius, could not imagine his literary career, which was just beginning to unfold. activities - their struggle with the wretched German reality. She was not reconciled with any kind of peace, any kind of structure of life.

The bitterness of separation from the lovely girl and the suffering of young Goethe were genuine. Goethe cut this tightly drawn knot. “He is gone, Kästner! When you receive these lines, know that he is gone...” - this is what Goethe wrote on the night before his flight from Wetzlar. - Now I am alone and have the right to cry. I leave you happy, but I will not stop living in your hearts."

“Werther,” said Goethe in his old age, “is also a creature that I, like a pelican, fed with the blood of my own heart.” All this is true, of course, but still does not give reason to see in Werther just a chapter of autobiography, arbitrarily equipped with a tragic ending with the suicide of a fictional hero. But Goethe is in no way Werther, no matter how much the author endows the hero with his own mental and spiritual qualities, including his own lyrical gift. The difference between the writer and the hero of the novel is not erased by the fact that “The Sorrows of a Young Man” Werther" are so densely saturated with episodes and moods taken from life itself, as it developed during Goethe's stay in Wetzlar; the poet's original letters, almost unchanged, also found their way into the text of the novel... All this "autobiographical material", more abundantly presented in "Werther", than in other works of Goethe, still remained only material that was organically included in the construction of an artistic and objective novel. In other words, "Werther" is a free poetic invention, and not a wingless recreation of facts that are not subordinated to a single ideological and artistic concept.

But, not being Goethe's autobiography, "The Sorrows of Young Werther" can with all the more justification be called a characteristic, typical "history of his contemporary." The commonality between the author and his hero comes down, first of all, to the fact that both of them are sons of pre-revolutionary Europe of the 18th century, both are equally drawn into the stormy cycle of new thinking, which broke with the traditional ideas that dominated human consciousness throughout the Middle Ages until the late baroque. This struggle against dilapidated traditions of thinking and feeling covered the most diverse areas of spiritual culture. Everything was questioned and revised back then.

Goethe for a long time toyed with the idea of ​​responding literary to everything he experienced in Wetzlar. The author of Werther connected the beginning of work on the novel with the moment he received news of the suicide of Jerusalem, whom he knew from Leipzig and Wetzlar. The plot, apparently, in general terms, took shape precisely then. But Goethe began writing the novel only on February 1, 1774. "Werther" was written extremely quickly. In the spring of that year it was already completed.

From life, from his expanded experience, Goethe drew other traits. Thus, he assigned the blue-eyed Charlotte the black eyes of Maximiliana Brentano, née von Laroche, with whom he maintained loving and friendly relations in Frankfurt; This is how he brought into the image of Albert the unattractive features of Maximiliana’s rude husband.

Werther's letters do not consist only of sorrowful lamentations. Out of his own needs and in accordance with Wilhelm’s wishes, some of his letters are narrative in nature. This is how the scenes that played out in the old man's house arose. Or the sharply satirical depiction of the arrogant aristocratic nobility at the beginning of the second part of the novel.

“The Sorrows of Young Werther,” as it is said, is a novel in letters, a genre characteristic of the literature of the 18th century. But while in the novels of Richardson and Rousseau the common narrative thread is woven by a number of correspondents and the letter of one character continues the letter of another, in Werther everything is written by one hand, the hand of the title character (minus the postscript of the “publisher”). This gives the novel a purely lyrical and monological quality, and this also allows the novelist to follow step by step the growth of the emotional drama of the ill-fated young man.