人妻少妇专区

In Review

On the face of it, Johann Goethe鈥攖he German novelist, poet, and playwright who lived from the second half of the 18th century through the first 32 years of the 19th鈥攚as a man of his times, a leading figure in European classicism and romanticism.

And yet he also speaks with striking immediacy to contemporary questions about what constitutes a family, says Susan Gustafson, the Karl F. and Bertha A. Fuchs Professor of German Studies and author of a new book, Goethe鈥檚 Families of the Heart (Bloomsbury Academia, 2016).

Goethe鈥檚 texts are filled with fractured relationships鈥攑arents who try to force their children into advantageous marriages, children who must choose between their own desires and familial acceptance, and lives twisted by shame and secrecy.

But while scholarship has focused on Goethe鈥檚 broken families, Gustafson鈥檚 attention was caught by something else: the alternative families that his characters construct for themselves.

鈥淭he main thing he鈥檚 claiming is that the fundamental essence of family is love,鈥� she says.

In the 1796 coming-of-age novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre, or Wilhelm Meister鈥檚 Apprenticeship, Goethe鈥檚 protagonist tries to exchange his future as a businessman for a life in the theater. He wanders the countryside, sometimes connecting with women, and sometimes with men, in a series of fluid, nonexclusive relationships. And he encounters many children, one of whom, named Felix, he suspects may be his biological son.

He 鈥渋mmediately connects to the children through his feelings of love, adopting them into his family,鈥� Gustafson says.

The stories embedded within the novel are about people learning what family is and how to build relationships with others. 鈥淗e describes it in terms of love鈥攈e鈥檚 in love with these people,鈥� she says. 鈥淎t one point, he鈥檚 with another man, and he has three children. Felix is one, and two others he has brought in as he鈥檚 traveling. And he says, 鈥楧as ist meine wunderbare Familie鈥�鈥� 鈥楾his is my wonderful family.鈥欌��

In the 1821 sequel, Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre, or Wilhelm Meister鈥檚 Travels, the character concludes that his purpose in life is to understand what holds people apart and remove those obstacles.

Goethe鈥檚 project, Gustafson suggests, was similar. She cites French theorist Michel Foucault鈥檚 argument that medical, legal, religious, and other forms of social discourse together created a definition of homosexuality. But as dominant discourses emerge, defining reality in certain ways, so, too, do alternatives. 鈥淚t鈥檚 going to open the door for someone to say, 鈥榃ait a minute鈥攖here鈥檚 another way to think about this.鈥� And that鈥檚 what I鈥檓 claiming Goethe is actually doing,鈥� she says.

A man of science as well as letters, Goethe brought to bear on his writing one of the main scientific interests of his day, the interaction of chemicals. His 1809 novel, Die Wahlverwandtschaften, or Elective Affinities鈥攖he term at the time for chemicals鈥� tendencies to combine with some substances but not others鈥攅xplores the idea in reference to human relationships.

He鈥檚 considering questions that are in the foreground today, Gustafson says: 鈥淗e brings up issues such as, can two men or two women be couples and bring up children? Are biological families always good? Can adoptive families be as good as biological families?鈥� And he鈥檚 showing that the configurations of families aren鈥檛 what matters, she says. 鈥淲hat matters is the love.鈥�

In Elective Affinities, two couples rearrange themselves so that, in the end, the two women are together, as are the two men. Scholars have tried to create a taxonomy of friendship and love in his work. 鈥淏ut Goethe doesn鈥檛 say anything like that,鈥� says Gustafson. He describes how the couples move into different configurations. 鈥淏ut he doesn鈥檛 say one arrangement is better than the other, more likely than the other. He just says, this happens.鈥�

Goethe鈥檚 writings found opposition in their day. His play Stella: A Play for Lovers (1776) originally ended with a man and two women in a m茅nage a trois. Audiences were outraged, and the play was removed from the stage. In 1806, Goethe rewrote it as Stella: A Tragedy. In that version, the man shoots himself and one of the women poisons herself.

鈥淎nd that was OK,鈥� says Gustafson. 鈥淭hat one, he could show.鈥�

But as he revised the ending, Goethe also reworked the rest of the play, strengthening the women鈥檚 expressions of love for each other. Scholars have been thrown off the scent of his project, Gustafson says, by a 1983 translation into English of what ostensibly was the 1806 text鈥攂ut actually was the 1776 text with the 1806 ending tacked on.

鈥淕oethe made 190 changes [to the 1776 text when he republished it 30 years later], but the only change they put in there was the ending, and so scholars have focused on that,鈥� she says. Gustafson now has a translation of both texts under contract for publication.

Critics have read Goethe with an eye to relationships between men. In fact, Gustafson鈥檚 own previous book鈥�Men Desiring Men: The Poetry of Same-Sex Identity and Desire in German Classicism (Wayne State University Press, 2002)鈥攚as in that vein. She says her new book extends that analysis, drawing in issues of women and families.

Gustafson鈥檚 reading of the author is influenced by her own life. She adopted two children and says her experiences heightened her awareness of representations of adoption in his writing.

鈥淭hroughout his literary work, Goethe brings up issues that people still struggle with,鈥� she says. 鈥淎nd he鈥檚 basically saying all kinds of families are equal.鈥�

鈥擪athleen McGarvey, with Bob Marcotte