"Das Lebend'ge will ich preisen" : from Ästhetik to Humanität : a comparative study of Byron and Goethe with special reference to Don Juan and the West-östlicher Divan

This comparative study of Byron and Goethe seeks to explore the idea that there may be a far more fundamental similarity between the mode of writing of these two poets than has been noted to date. Although there has been, and continues to be, much written about each poet individually there has been little produced on the two poets considered together since the first half of the 20th century - the biographical coincidences and the influence of Goethe's Faust on Byron's Manfred having been exhausted. The initial chapter of this thesis examines this debate before proceeding, in Chapters 2 and 3, to an examination, first of all Goethe's reception of Byron as revealed in his letters, journals, conversations and reviews and then, similarly, to Byron's reception of Goethe. Suspecting that the uniquely aesthetic, vital quality of Byron's and Goethe's poetry may well be the common factor in both, it is an exploration of this 'particularity' that provides the focus in Chapter 4. Having established that there is a fundamental link between Goethe and Byron in their views about art, aesthetics and the function of poetry, it is to close textual analysis of the West-östlicher Divan and Don Juan that I turn in Chapter 5. This close examination illuminates these connections better than any purely theoretical analysis could, and thus appropriately supports Goethe's and Byron's view that the only way to express the particular is precisely through the particular.

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

PhD

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Glasgow

Year dc:date.issued

1999

Author dc:creator

• Allan, Shona Millar

• PT Germanic literature
• PR English literature

Language dc:language

en