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Goethe
News and Notes, XVII.2 (Fall 1996)
GSNA Events at the 1996 MLA Convention in Washington,
DC
BUSINESS MEETING OF THE GSNA
Saturday, 28 December 1996
10:15-11:30 p.m.
Edison Room, Washington Hilton
Ehrhard Bahr, presiding
--Reading and approval of the minutes
of the last Business Meeting.
--President's Report, by Ehrhard Bahr.
--Treasurer's Report, by Todd Kontje.
--Executive Secretary's Report, by Meredith
Lee.
--Yearbook Editor's Report, by
Thomas P. Saine.
--New business.
* * *
PROGRAM SPONSORED BY THE GSNA
Saturday, 28 December 1996
8:30 a.m.-9:45 a.m.
Monroe Ballroom East
Washington Hilton and Towers
Goethe: The Poet as Parodist.
Gabrielle Bersier, Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis
presiding
The Esther Dramas in Goethe's Jahrmarktsfest zu Plundersweilern.
Sean Ward, Stanford University
Der Triumph der Empfindsamkeit: Goethe as Self-Parodist. Astrida Orle
Tantillo, University of Illinois at Chicago
Goethe's Faust as Parodia Christiana. Ehrhard Bahr, University
of California, Los Angeles
The parodic device of Goethe's Wahlverwandtschaften. Gabrielle
Bersier. Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis
* * *
Minutes of the 1995 Business Meeting, Chicago, December 29, 1995
The meeting of the Goethe Society of North America was called to order
at 12:00 p.m. President Bahr welcomed members and noted that in the
future we may have to consult our newsletters for the place and time
of the business meeting since it will likely not be listed in the MLA
program.
The minutes were approved unanimously without discussion.
President's Report: President Bahr noted the passing of member Marilyn
Torbruegge and a moment of silence was observed.
President Bahr reported on the meeting of the Goethe Gesellschaft in
Weimar, "Goethe und seine Zeitgenossen," at which the Golden
Goethe Medal was presented to member Stuart Atkins. He expressed appreciation
for former president Jane Brown's efforts to establish contact with
the Goethe Gesellschaft.
The Society is working on establishing a prize for junior scholars (i.e.,
scholars who have received the Ph.D. within the last four years) for
a dissertation, published book or article. The announcement and the
regulations will be published soon. The prize will be about $500.
Looking forward to 1999, the 250th anniversary of Goethe's birth, the
GSNA may serve as a clearing house for planned, conferences, sessions
and memorials.
There was some discussion of the topic for next year's MLA sessions
and the suggestion from Gabrielle Bersier, "The Poet as Parodist,"
was accepted. It was also suggested that the panel be advertised widely
in order to draw on as large a pool of potential participants as possible.
Professor Bersier will organize the panel.
Treasurer's Report: Secretary-Treasurer Todd Kontje was not present
and Executive Secretary Meredith Lee reported in his place. The written
report was circulated and discussed. Yearbook Editor Thomas Saine was
praised for doing much of the clerical work himself and thereby keeping
yearbook costs down. A contribution to the Wittkowski festschrift was
explained as a result of a decision to contribute to the festschrifts
of founding members. The report was accepted.
There was a question about the previously discussed publication of a
facing-pages edition of both versions of Werther and it was decided
that this would only duplicate the Münchner Ausgabe's presentation
of the novel(s). This edition is prohibitively expensive for students
but it is expected that a paperback version may be published. In the
meantime, Goldmann puts out the first version in paperback and dtv the
second.
Executive Secretary's Report: MLA has now limited allied organizations
to 2 sessions, 1995 being the last year in which 3 were possible. We
keep the business meeting and the GSNA session and hope that the business
meeting will appear in the "Special Listings" section, which
was not the case this year.
The GSNA will sponsor a session at the next GSA conference in Seattle.
Scott Abbott will organize this session. GSA encourages GSNA members
to join the GSA.
A planned series of one-day conferences on work done by Goethe 200 years
previously will begin this Fall at the William Andrews Clark Memorial
Library in Los Angeles. The topic will be Wilhelm Meister and
the Bildungsroman. The date has not yet been set. Peter Reill, UCLA,
Director of the Clark Library, has offered that organization's sponsorship.
Rayond Burt of Loyola University will be constructing a GSNA Home Page
and we will be able to post new items on that web site, thus making
it easier for GSNA members to remain current with events and deadlines
that the Newsletter cannot always accommodate.
There was no Yearbook Editor's report. Members were referred
to the announcements in the newsletter including the invitation to submit
to volume 8 and to observe the Chicago Manual of Style's regulations.
The meeting concluded at 12:45 p.m.
Submitted by Gail K. Hart
* * *
GLORIA FLAHERTY SCHOLARSHIP FUND Established through $25,000 Bequest
In memory of her daughter Gloria, Jean Flaherty has bequeathed to the
Goethe Society of North America $25,000 for the creation of a scholarship
fund "to provide financial aid to worthy undergraduate and/or graduate
students who wish to further their education in areas related to the
interests promoted by the society."
The scholarship fund will be administered by the GSNA Board of Directors,
who will define the awards and criteria for the selection of students.
Gloria Flaherty was a Founding Member of the Goethe Society of North
America.
In Memoriam
Victor Lange
Frank Ryder
VICTOR LANGE (1908-1996)
Victor Lange, founding president (1980-89) of the Goethe Society of
North America, died on June 29, 1996, in Princeton, New Jersey, two
weeks before his eighty-eighth birthday.
Victor was born in Leipzig on July 13, 1908. There he attended the historic
Thomas-Schule and went on to the university, from which in 1934 he received
his Ph.D. (in Anglistik). Already as a student Victor displayed a lively
interest in the world outside Germany. Following semesters at Oxford,
the Sorbonne, and Munich, he was the first German exchange student at
University College, Toronto, where he took his M.A. in 1931. Returning
to Leipzig, he served for a year as director of the university's Akademische
Auslandsstelle. But the lure of the New World brought him back to Toronto
as a lecturer in German. Following Hitler's election in 1933 Victor
chose to remain in Canada, where he taught for several more years and
participated actively in amateur theatrics.
In 1938 Victor moved to Cornell University, where he quickly rose through
the ranks to professor. In 1957 he was called to Princeton to chair
what was then the German Section in a Department of Modern Languages
and, a year later, the newly established Department of Germanic Languages
and Literatures. Victor quickly put his fledgling department on the
map through several bold coups. In 1966, at his invitation, Gruppe 47
met at Princeton. As president of the Internationale Vereinigung der
Germanisten, Victor hosted its 1970 meeting, which brought four hundred
leading scholars of German literature to the United States.
Following his retirement in 1977 as John N. Woodhull Professor of Modern
Languages, Victor continued what seemed to be a tireless schedule of
teaching at universities around the world, from the Free University
of Berlin, where he had been an Honorary Professor since 1963, by way
of La Jolla and Davis, to Australia and New Zealand.
Victor was noted above all for his studies of eighteenth-century German
literature, culminating in his now standard volume on The Classical
Age of German Literature (1982) -- and particularly for his scholarship
on Goethe. His first contributions appeared in the Goethe Year of 1949:
a general appreciation in Saturday Review of Literature, an essay
in Yale Review on "Goethe: Science and Poetry," and
his translation of Goethe's Sorrows of Young Werther. These early
works reflect Victor's recognition of the need to function as a mediator
of German culture in the United States -- an initiative that later led
to his editorship of such influential projects as the Prentice-Hall
Twentieth-Century Views collection of essays on Goethe and the
twelve-volume Suhrkamp edition of Goethe in English. At the same time,
over a period of forty years he expanded our critical understanding
of Goethe with some two dozen scholarly articles, many of which were
gathered in his volume of Goethe-Studien (1990), as well as two
volumes in the Munich edition of Goethes Werke and a biography
of Goethe (Reclam, 1992). For these impressive accomplishments he was
awarded the Gold Medal of the Goethe Institute (1966) and the Gold Medal
"for lifetime achievement" from the Weimar Goethe Gesellschaft
(1993). The Festschrift presented to him on his retirement was appropriately
entitled Aspekte der Goethezeit.
However, Victor's interest were wide-ranging. An early student of literary
sociology, he wrote his dissertation on Die Lyrik and ihr Publikum
im England des 18. Jahrhunderts. Ten years later he published one
of the earliest introductions to Modern German Literature (1945).
His criticism, characterized by a style that was clear, forceful, and
elegant in English as well as German, continued to move between those
two centuries.
Victor's accomplishments as a scholar over some sixty years and his
contributions to German-American cultural relations brought him many
honors: two Guggenheims as well as an NEH Fellowship; a Fulbright Senior
Lectureship as well as appointment as Phi Beta Kappa visiting scholar.
From Germany he received in 1959 the Commander's Cross of the Order
of Merit for his "role in building a new and lasting era of German-American
friendship and partnership" and the Friedrich Gundolf Prize of
the Darmstadt Akademie (1966).
Victor was in every sense a "statesman of learning," as Hans-Jürgen
Schings called him in a recent Nachruf. More than any scholar of his
generation, he shaped the image of German studies in postwar United
States. The Chancellor's Citation that he received in 1975 from the
University of California at Davis accurately designated him as our "Dean
of German Studies." But we shall miss more than his scholarship
and cultural statesmanship. We shall miss, above all, his wise, ironic
counsel, his selfless efforts for our profession, his genial collegiality,
and his warm friendship.
Theodore Ziolkowski
Princeton University
From the Editor of the Goethe Yearbook
At this time I am inviting submissions to be considered for inclusion
in volume nine of the Goethe Yearbook. The Yearbook is open to papers
on any aspect or author of the "Goethezeit," not just on Goethe.
In contrast to many other publications, there is no stringent limit
on the length of papers that can be considered. We adhere more or less
to the Chicago Manual of Style rather than to the MLA Style Sheet.
Thomas P. Saine
Editor
GOETHE WEIMARER AUSGABE ON CD-ROM
In response to Meredith Lee's request in Goethe News and Notes
17/1 (Spring 1996), I send this report on the new Chadwyck-Healey database
Goethes Werke auf CD-ROM.
One feature of the recent annual conference of the Canadian Association
of University Teachers of German (CAUTG), held in May 1996 at Brock
University, St. Catharine's, Ontario, was a session on this database.
Five Goethe scholars volunteered to participate in an in-lab demonstration
and test (Linda Dietrick, University of Winnepeg; Marianne Henn, University
of Alberta; Christoph Lorey, University of New Brunswick; Gisela Brude-Firnau
and David John, University of Waterloo). The open session was attended
by many other interested colleagues. Several weeks beforehand, the five
participants were asked to submit a list of "Goethe-research"
questions they would like to pose to the database and its demonstrator,
Daniel Boivin of Chadwyck-Healey. The brave and charming Mr. Boivin
(a Montrealer), who is not a Germanist and speaks no German, used his
knowledge of the database and training in library science to prepare
answers to these questions in advance, in consultation with contracted
Germanists in London, England. He then produced them as part of his
demonstration of the software, documenting both questions and answers
in a handsome package of materials for attendees to study later. Further
questions, discussion and an opportunity for hands-on exploration followed.
Participants' questions were wide-ranging, including general inquiries
about the nature and power of the system's search engine, links between
words or passages and the critical apparatus, length of search strings,
the collection of citations, problems of orthographic variants, relationship
to the Goethe-Wörterbuch, comprehensiveness (the database contains
more than the WA alone), comparisons to the Frankfurter and Münchner
Ausgaben, and the representation of images. There were also many detailed,
specific requests, such as "Produce a list of places in the text
where 'Hunger, Weiblichkeit, Frau, Nichtessen, Schweigen, Schreiben'
appear in close proximity... Make a comparison between Goethe's use
of the words 'heiter' and 'trübe', with all lexical variants."
On the whole the questions were answered and the scholars' inquiries
satisfied. Four months later they were asked to provide a brief evaluation
of the session and the database. All of the responses were positive.
Here is a sampling: "An excellent product, produced to high scholarly
standards and with the various needs of scholars in mind. The search
engine is of course what's revolutionary: it makes the old concordances
obsolete... The session gave us a glimpse into how much more we may
be able to learn about the works and their contextual and temporal framework
with the help of CD-ROM. We may get immediate answers to many more questions
about the intricacies of texts and thus will learn more about their
aesthetic and notional wealth...Very useful, and I can only say that
I hope some will actually buy it and then let me use it...wishful thinking."
The price tag around $6,000 seems to be the only major impediment to
further use.
David G. John, University of Waterloo
(for Gisela Brude-Firnau, Linda Dietrick, Marianne Henn and Chris Lorey)
* * *
GOETHE HOLDINGS ONLINE
Last year the Beinecke Library catalogue for printed materials went
online. All catalogued printed books and pamphlets, including those
in the William A. Speck Collection of Goetheana, now have Orbis records.
Finding aids for the main series of manuscripts in the Speck collection
are also available online via the Beinecke homepage at www.library.yale.edu/beinecke/
brblhome.htm. Not yet catalogued on line are manuscript scores in the
Speck Collection, the Alica Raphael papers, and the Winckler archive
(correspondence of Theodor Hell). The same url provides access to the
latest information about the Beinecke Visiting Fellowship Program and
an online version of the guide to the Beinecke collections, which includes
an overview of the German Literature Collection. There is also a Beinecke
link on the GSNA homepage.
Christa Sammons
Yale University
* * *
Looking Ahead to the 1997 ASECS Conference in Nashville
The Goethe Society Session at the 1997 ASECS conference in Nashville,
Tennessee April 9-12 will be chaired by Burkhard Henke, Davidson College,
and Simon Richter, University of Maryland, College Park:
The City of Weimar: Mapping Cultural Studies
Weimar Fashion and the Fear it Provoked. Daniel Purdy, Columbia University
Digging up Weimar's Classical Skeletons. W. Daniel Wilson, University
of California, Berkeley
Weimar II. The Revival of Goethe's Weimar in the 1840s: A Study in Cultural
archeology. Ehrhard Bahr, University of California, Los Angeles
CASH BAR AT THE MLA
Sunday, 29 December, 5:15-6:30 p.m.
Jefferson Ballroom East, Washington Hilton and Towers
Members of the Goethe Society of North America are cordially invited
to join their colleagues for drinks and conversation on Sunday, December
29, at 5:15 p.m. The Cash Bar is organized by the German Department
of the University of California, Irvine.
* * *
OTHER NEWS AND NOTES
Recent Publications by Members
Steven D. Martinson. Harmonious Tensions: The Writings of Friedrich
Schiller. University of Delaware Press, 1996. $55.
Christoph Schweitzer. "Goethe's Iphigenie auf Tauris: 'Gleich Opfergerüchen'
('Parzenlied') in Life's Golden Tree: Essays in German Literature
from the Renaissance to Rilke, ed. Thomas Kerth and George C. Schoolfield,
Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1996, 141-52; also some 200 Goethe Quotations,
in: The Columbia World of Quotations on CD-ROM, ed. Robert Andrews
et al. New York: Columbia University Press, 1996.
Forthcoming:
Peter R. Erspamer. The Elusiveness of Tolerance: The "Jewish
Question" from Lessing to the Napoleonic Wars. Chapel Hill
and London: University of North Carolina Press, 1997 (Studies in Germanic
Languages and Literatures, vol. 117).
GSNA PROGRAMS
The GSNA sponsored two sessions at the annual meeting of the German
Studies Association in Seattle, October 10-13, 1996. When the last newsletter
went to print, we were still awaiting word about whether both sessions
would be given program slots. Consequently, we only named half the participants.
In the end, five papers were read on Goethe and Philosophy in panels
chaired by Scott Abbott, Brigham Young University:
Eric Williams, Texas A&M University, "Eros and the Philosophy
of the Mirror: Goethe's Mimetic Desire"; Nicholas Rennie, Yale
University, "Untimely Recollections of Goethean Time: Nietzsche
and the Moment as 'umfassendes Symbol' "; William Davis, Colorado
College, "The Return of the Material in Weimar Classicism: Goethe
and Schiller"; Géza von Molnár, Northwestern University,
"Literature as Experiment?"; Armin Westerhoff, Yale University,
"Art and Experience in Plotinus and in Goethe's Wilhelm Meisters
Wanderjahre oder die Entsagenden."
* * *
In the Spring 1996 newsletter the report on the GSNA session "Goethe
as Theater Director (1791-1817)" at SEASECS held in Tallahassee,
Florida in March 1996 omitted one of the four program participants:
Erich-Oskar Wruck, Davidson College made a slide presentation on "The
Eighteenth-Century Theater Building in Lauchstädt."
* * *
The first Southern California regional meeting of the GSNA took place
on October 26, 1996 at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library. Some
30 people gathered to discuss Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. Papers
were read by Jane K. Brown, University of Washington: The Rake's Calling
and Ehrhard Bahr, UCLA: Problems in Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre Scholarship.
The program concluded with a reception hosted by Peter Reill, Director
of the UCLA Center for 17th- and 18th-Century Studies. A 1997 meeting
is planned, with Hermann und Dorothea selected as the core text. The
200th anniversary of its publication serves as the occasion for its
reassessment.
* * *
DID GOETHE SAY IT? IF SO, WHERE?
The greater visibility of the GSNA on the web has brought a steady flow
of inquiries about Goethe, the Goethe Institute (!), and Goethe quotations.
Some we answer immediately ("What Goethe poem has a father holding
a child, but the child dies in his arms?"); some we refer to specialists
in our organization; some we save for the newsletter.
If you have the time and expertise to respond here are some recent inquiries.
Please feel free to respond directly to the person seeking assistance.
I would appreciate a copy of your answer, either by e-mail or regular
mail.
1. "We are here to be human -- not perfect." Geoffrey Pearce,
a psychology student in New South Wales, Australia, who is writing a
dissertation on perfectionism, would like assistance in identifying
the quotation: gdp01@uow.edu.au or c/o Psychology Department, University
of Wollongong, Northfields Avenue, Wollongong 2522, New South Wales,
Australia.
2. "I am an Architecture student at Cal Poly and interested in
possible correlations between Goethe's views of industry and the consequences
of human separation from the natural world through architectural means.
Could you suggest further reading or sources, and locations where these
may be found?" L. J. Kelsey; e-mail: lori_kelsey@eee.org
3. "I am looking to the derivation of a quote attributed to Goethe.
The quote is: 'We look for what we know, we find what we look for'."
Demosthenes Lorandos, Ph.D., J.D., 7465 Valley Forge Road, Brighton,
Michigan 48116-8834; drd@tir.com
4. "I am hoping you can help me with a rather unusual problem.
I am looking for a poem by Goethe, but I am at a significant disadvantage.
I know only that the poem is about two birds that are from different
places but hear the same song. There is a reference to that poem in
the movie 'Only You'. If the poem exists, I am hoping to use it in my
plan to propose to my girl friend. The details of my significant disadvantage
are this: I am living in central Japan with no access to English sources
on the subject and by conventional search methods. I would be at a loss
as I know neither the title nor the first line of the poem. It is my
hope to obtain the full English text of this poems. If this is not possible,
I would be content with even a title that might allow me to pursue other
means of obtaining this work. I cannot stress the importance of this
matter to me. Albeit, at the same time I understand the request I am
making of your time and knowledge. I can offer no compensation short
of my deepest gratitude. If you are able to lend any assistance in this
search, I would appreciate a reply through any media. My name is Derek
Smith. My tel./fax. number is +81-263-34-8952; my e-mail: esidcs@po.cnet.or.jp;
my mailing address: Derek Smith, 1-4-13-101 Uzuhashi, Matsumotoshi,
Naganoken, Japan 390
5. "I am the editor at Celestial Seasonings Teas. I am responsible
for reprinting quotations on our tea boxes. I have frequently seen the
following essay attributed to Goethe. But I have been unable to track
down an original source for it. Would someone affiliated with your organization
know where this came from? I'd be happy to send some tea in exchange
for your help. I may also be interest in commissioning a new English
translation of it. The essay is:
Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back....Concerning
all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth
that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that
the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too.
All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have
occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising
in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material
assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.
Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius,
power, and magic in it. Begin it now.
Ellen Kresky
e-mail: ekresky@ctea.com
Editor's Note: The Goethe Society has received some 10 inquiries about
the closing sentences in Ellen Kresky's quotation. This is the first
time a larger context has been provided. Did Goethe write it?
***
The deadline for the Spring issue of Goethe News and Notes is
April 15. I would like to continue the practice of listing any significant
publications on Goethe by GSNA members, as well as completed dissertations,
and would be grateful to receive such information regularly from you.
Members are encouraged to propose special sessions at regional meetings
of the MLA and ASECS. If you would like to propose a session sponsored
by GSNA at MWASECS or any other regional meeting, contact me for assistance
with publicity and mailing lists.
Meredith Lee
Executive Secretary
OFFICERS OF THE GOETHE SOCIETY OF NORTH AMERICA
President: Ehrhard Bahr, Department of Germanic Languages, UCLA, Los
Angeles, CA 90024-1539. (310) 825-3955 (o); (310) 825-9754 (fax). E-mail:
BAHR@humnet.ucla.edu
Vice-President: Ben Bennett, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures,
Cocke Hall, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22903. (804)
924-6695 (o); (804) 831-2423 (h). E-mail: bkb@virginia.edu
Secretary-Treasurer: Todd Kontje, Department of Literature 0410, University
of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0410. (615) 534-3210 (o);
E-mail: tkontje@ucsd.edu
Director-at-Large: Scott Abbott, Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages,
4094 JKHB, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602. (801) 378-3207
(o); (801) 226-5317 (h); (801) 378-4649 (fax). E-mail: scott_abbott@byu.edu
Director-at-Large: Irmgard Wagner, Department of Foreign Languages and
Literatures, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA 22030. (703) 993-1220/
1221 (o); (703) 993-1245 (fax). E-mail: iwagner@gmu.edu
Editor of the Yearbook: Thomas P. Saine, Department of German, University
of California, Irvine, CA 92697-3150. (949) 824-6406 (o); FAX (949)
824-6416; E-mail: TPSAINE@uci.edu.
Executive Secretary: Meredith Lee, German Department, University of
California, Irvine, CA 92697-3150. (949) 824-6406 (o); (949) 836-7970
(h); FAX (949) 824-6416; E-mail: MALEE@uci.edu.
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