The Invention of Nature

Chapter 2: Imagination and Nature

1

Humboldt in Jena: AH first went to Jena in July 1792 and stayed together with his brother Wilhelm at Friedrich Schiller’s house but he only met Goethe briefly in March 1794, and then again in December 1794; AH to Carl Freiesleben, 6 July 1792, AH Letters 1973, p.202; Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.303.

2

progressive Jena: Merseburger 2009, p.113; Safranski 2011, p.70.

3

liberty in Jena: Schiller to Christian Gottlob Voigt, 6 April 1795, Schiller Letters 1943–2003, vol.27, p.173.

4

Weimar description: Merseburger 2009, p.72.

5

brightest minds in Jena and Weimar: de Staël 1815, vol.1, p.116.

6

WH and Schiller at market square: Wilhelm lived at Unterm Markt 4 and Schiller lived at Unterm Markt 1, AH Letters 1973, p.386.

7

WH invited Goethe: WH to Goethe, 14 December 1794, Goethe Letters 1980–2000, vol.1, p.350.

8

noisy discussions: Maria Körner, 1796, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.222; for daily meetings see Goethe’s diaries during this time.

9

He ‘forced us’: Goethe, 17–19 December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.116.

10

‘In eight days’: Goethe to Karl August, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, March 1797, ibid., p.288.

11

AH visit December 1794: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, pp.31–2; December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, pp.116–17, 122; Goethe to Max Jacobi, 2 February 1795, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, pp.194, 557; AH to Reinhard von Haeften, 19 December 1794, AH Letters 1973, p.388.

12

frozen Rhine: Boyle 2000, p.256.

13

walking to anatomy lectures: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.32.

14

Goethe and stove: Goethe to Schiller, 27 February 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, p.257.

15

AH stimulated Goethe: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.122.

16

Karl August in

Werther

uniform: Merseburger 2009, p.67.

17

Werther

fever: Friedenthal 2003, p.137.

18

Goethe’s early years in Weimar: Merseburger 2009, pp.68–9; Boyle 1992, p.202ff., 243ff.

19

Christiane Vulpius: Goethe eventually married Christiane Vulpius in 1806.

20

‘that of a woman’: Botting 1973, p.38.

21

‘fat of his cheeks’: Karl August Böttiger about Goethe, mid-1790s, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.354.

22

‘Apollo’ and changed appearance: Maria Körner to K.G. Weber, August 1796, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.223.

23

Goethe’s son in miner’s uniform: Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.354.

24

‘cold, mono-syllabled God’: Jean Paul Friedrich Richter to Christian Otto, 1796, quoted in Klauss 1991, p.14; for Goethe’s arrogance: Friedrich Hölderlin to Christian Ludwig Neuffer, 19 January 1795, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.356.

25

Goethe rude: W. von Schak about Goethe, 9 January 1806, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.6, p.4.

26

‘sacred poetic fire’: Henry Crabb Robinson, 1801, Robinson 1869, vol.1, p.86.

27

‘No one was more isolated’: Goethe, 1791, quoted in Safranski 2011, p.103.

28

‘the great Mother’: Goethe, ibid., p.106.

29

Goethe’s house and garden: Klauss 1991; Ehrlich 1983; Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, pp.295–6

30

‘was getting tired’: Goethe to Johannn Peter Eckermann, 12 May 1825, Goethe Eckermann 1999, p.158.

31

‘most melancholic mood’: Goethe, 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.26.

32

lived like hermit: Goethe, 1790, ibid., p.19.

33

‘plank in a shipwreck’: Goethe, 1793, ibid., p.25.

34

18,000 specimens: Ehrlich 1983, p.7.

35

Metamorphosis of Plants

: Goethe,

Versuch die Metamorphose der Pflanzen zu erklären

, 1790.

36

‘Forwards and backwards’: Goethe,

Italienische Reise

, Goethe 1967, vol.11, p.375.

37

AH ignited Goethe’s interest: Goethe to Karl Ludwig von Knebel, 28 March 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, pp.260–61.

38

Goethe and

urform

: Richards 2002, p.445ff.; Goethe in 1790, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.20.

39

AH proposed to publish: Goethe, 1795, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.122.

40

Goethe dictated: Goethe to Jacobi, 2 February 1795, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, p.194; Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.122.

41

‘That’s how I walk’: Karl August Böttiger about Goethe, January 1795, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.123.

42

AH’s visits to Jena and Weimar: 6–10 March 1794, 15–16 April 1794, 14–19 December 1794, 16–20 April 1795, 13 January 1797, 1 March–30 May 1797.

43

‘early morning corrected’: Goethe, 9 March 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, p.100.

44

‘whipped the scientific: Goethe to Karl Ludwig von Knebel, 28 March 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, pp.260–61.

45

Goethe in Jena spring 1797: Goethe stayed until 31 March 1797; see his diary and letters from that time, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, p.288ff.; Goethe, March–May 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, pp.99–115; Goethe’s Year 1994, pp.58–9.

46

trying to finish his book: Humboldt’s

Versuch über die gereizte Muskel- und Nervenfaser

(

Experiment on the Stimulated Muscle and Nerve Fibre

); AH to Carl Freiesleben, 18 April 1797, AH to Friedrich Schuckmann, 14 May 1797, AH Letters 1973, pp.574, 579.

47

AH’s work in Jena: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 18 April 1797, AH to Friedrich Schuckmann, 14 May 1797, AH Letters 1973, pp.574, 579.

48

AH’s lectures on galvanism: Goethe, 3, 5, 6 March 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, p.99.

49

‘pierced by shotgun’: AH to Friedrich Schuckmann, 14 May 1797, AH Letters 1973, p.580.

50

‘I cannot exist without’: Ibid., p.579.

51

AH’s favourite experiment: AH,

Versuch über die gereizte Muskel- und Nervenfaser

, 1797, vol.1, p.76ff.

52

‘breathing life into it’: Ibid.,p.79.

53

‘neither matter nor force’: Goethe,

Erster Entwurf einer Allgemeinen Einleitung in die Vergleichende Anatomie

, 1795, p.18.

54

Goethe and organism: Richards 2002, p.450ff.; see also Immanuel Kant,

Kritik der Urteilskraft

, Kant 1957, vol.5, p.488.

55

Goethe captivated: Goethe to Karl Ludwig von Knebel, 28 March 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, pp.260–61.

56

Goethe’s work in 1797: Goethe 1797, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.59; Goethe, March–May 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, pp.99–115.

57

‘Our little academy’: Goethe to Karl August, 14 March 1797, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.291.

58

WH, Aeschylus and Goethe: 27 March 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, p.103.

59

optical apparatus with AH: Goethe, 19 and 27 March 1797, ibid., pp.102–3.

60

investigated phosphor with AH: Goethe, 20 March 1797, ibid., p.102.

61

friends meeting in Jena: Goethe, 25 March 1797, ibid., p.102.

62

to Weimar ‘to recover’: Goethe to Karl Ludwig von Knebel, 28 March 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, p.260.

63

woken from hibernation: Goethe to Friedrich Schiller, 26 April 1797, Schiller and Goethe 1856, vol.1, p.301.

64

Schiller worried about Goethe: Biermann 1990b, pp.36–7.

65

‘poverty of meaning’: Friedrich Schiller to Christian Gottfried Körner, 6 August 1797; Christian Gottfried Körner to Friedrich Schiller, 25 August 1797, Schiller and Körner 1847, vol.4, pp.47, 49.

66

Goethe invited AH: Goethe to AH, 14 April 1797, AH Letters 1973, p.573; for AH’s visit see Goethe, 19–24 April 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, p.106; AH to Johannes Fischer, 27 April 1797, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.306.

67

Goethe in Jena: Goethe, 25, 29–30 April, 19–30 May 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, pp.107, 109, 115.

68

AH and Goethe at Schiller’s Garden House: Goethe, 19, 25, 26, 29, 30 May 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, pp.109, 112, 113, 115.

69

stone table: Goethe to Johannn Peter Eckermann, 8 October 1827, Goethe Eckermann 1999, p.672.

70

song of nightingales: Friedrich Schiller to Goethe, 2 May 1797, Schiller and Goethe 1856, vol.1, p.304.

71

‘art, nature and’: Goethe, 16 March 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, p.101.

72

Kant and Copernicus: Kant, Preface to the second edition of the

Critique of Pure Reason

, 1787.

73

AH learning from Kant: AH to Wilhelm Gabriel Wegener, 27 February 1789, AH Letters 1973, p.44.

74

Kant’s lectures: Elden and Mendieta 2011, p.23.

75

‘most fashionable seat’: Henry Crabb Robinson, 1801, Stelzig 2010, p.59; they were also discussing Johann Gottlieb Fichte’s

Doctrine of Science.

Fichte took Kant’s ideas of subjectivity, self-consciousness and the external world, and pushed them even further by eliminating Kant’s dualism. Fichte worked at the university in Jena and became one of the founding fathers of German Idealism. According to him there was no ‘thing-in-itself’ – all consciousness was based on the Self, not the external world. With this Fichte declared subjectivity as the first principle of understanding the world. If Fichte were correct, the consequences for the sciences would be momentous because then independent objectivity would not be possible. For Goethe and AH discussing Fichte, see Goethe, 12, 14, 19 March 1797, Goethe Diary 1998–2007, vol.2, pt.1, pp.101–2.

76

‘study himself to death’: AH to Wilhelm Gabriel Wegener, 27 February 1789, AH Letters 1973, p.44.

77

Kant as important as Jesus: Morgan 1990, p.26.

78

AH on Kant: AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.1, p.197; see also Knobloch 2009.

79

‘within ourselves’: AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.1, p.64; AH Kosmos 1845–50, vol.1, pp.69–70.

80

‘melt into each’: AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.1, p.64; AH Kosmos 1845–50, vol.1, p.70.

81

‘The senses do not’: Goethe,

Maximen und Reflexionen

, no.295, Buttimer 2001, p.109; see also Jackson 1994, p.687.

82

‘vivid phantasy confuses’: AH to Johann Leopold Neumann, 23 June 1791, AH Letters 1973, p.142.

83

‘Nature must be experienced’: AH to Goethe, 3 January 1810, Goethe Humboldt Letters 1909, p.305; see also AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.1, p.73; AH Kosmos 1845–50, vol.1, p.85.

84

‘moss-embroider’d beds’: Darwin (1789) 1791, line 232.

85

popularity of poem in England: King-Hele 1986, pp.67–8.

86

‘powerful and productive’: AH to Charles Darwin, 18 September 1839, Darwin Correspondence, vol.2, p.426. AH referred to Erasmus Darwin’s book

Zoomania

which was published in Germany in 1795; see also AH to Samuel Thomas von Sömmerring, 29 June 1795, AH Letters 1973, p.439.

87

‘poetic feeling’: Goethe to Friedrich Schiller, 26–27 January 1798, Schiller Letters 1943–2003, vol.37, pt.1, p.234

88

‘greatest antagonists’: Goethe Morphologie 1987, p.458.

89

Goethe worked on

Faust

: Late December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.117; Goethe, 1796, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.53; WH to Friedrich Schiller, 17 July 1795, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.393; Safranski 2011, p.191; Friedrich Schiller to Goethe, 26 June 1797, Schiller and Goethe, 1856, vol.1, p.322; originally conceived as the

Urfaust

in the early 1770s, Goethe had also published a short

Fragment

of the drama in 1790.

90

‘feverish unrest’:

Faust

I, Scene 1, Night, line 437, Goethe’s

Faust

(trans. Kaufmann 1961, p.99); I have used two different translations and have picked those quotes that come closest to the original. The translations are by Walter Kaufmann (1961) and David Luke (2008).

91

‘I’ve never known’: Goethe to Johann Friedrich Unger, 28 March 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, p.558.

92

‘all Nature’s hidden’:

Faust

I, Scene 1, Night, line 441, Goethe’s

Faust

(trans. Kaufmann 1961, p.99).

93

‘That I may detect’: Ibid., lines 382ff. (p.95).

94

‘Humboldt seemed to her as’ (footnote): Louise Nicolovius, as told by Charlotte von Stein, 20 January 1810, recalling a conversation with Goethe, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.5, p.381.

95

‘Metamorphosis of Plants’: Goethe composed and published the poem in 1797, Goethe, 1797, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.59.

96

‘all chemical combinations’: Pierre-Simon Laplace,

Exposition du systême du monde

, 1796, see Adler 1990, p.264.

97

‘We snatch in vain’:

Faust

I, Act 1, Night, lines 672–5, Goethe’s

Faust

(trans. Luke 2008, p.23).

98

combine nature and art: AH to Goethe, 3 January 1810, Goethe Humboldt Letters 1909, p.304.

99

‘had destroyed all’: John Keats, 28 December 1817, recounted by Benjamin Robert Haydon, Haydon 1960–63, vol.2, p.173.

100 ‘affected me powerfully’: AH to Caroline von Wolzogen, 14 May 1806, Goethe AH WH Letters 1876, p.407.

101 ‘new organs’: Ibid.