Faust I & Ii, Volume 2 (ebook)

Argumento de Faust I & Ii, Volume 2 (ebook)

One of the great classics of European literature, Faust is Goethe’s most complex and profound work. To tell the dramatic and tragic story of one man’s pact with the Devil in exchange for knowledge and power, Goethe drew from an immense variety of cultural and historical material, and a wealth of poetic and theatrical traditions. What results is a tour de force illustrating Goethe’s own moral and artistic development, and a symbolic, cautionary tale of Western humanity striving restlessly and ruthlessly for progress.

Capturing the sense, poetic variety, and tonal range of the German original in present-day English, Stuart Atkins’s translation presents the formal and rhythmic dexterity of Faust in all its richness and beauty, without recourse to archaisms or interpretive elaborations.

Featuring a new introduction by David Wellbery, this Princeton Classics edition of Faust is the definitive English version of a timeless masterpiece.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) was one of the greatest artists of the German Romantic period. He was a poet, playwright, novelist, and natural philosopher. David E. Wellbery is the LeRoy T. and Margaret Deffenbaugh Carlson University Professor in the Department of Germanic Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Chicago.0INTRODUCTION xi
FAUST: A Tragedy
DEDICATION 1
PRELUDE ON THE STAGE 3
PROLOGUE IN HEAVEN 9

PART ONE
NIGHT (Faust's Study I: Easter Eve) 13
OUTSIDE THE CITY GATE (Easter-Day Walk) 23
FAUST'S STUDY (II: Easter Night) 32
FAUST'S STUDY (III: Pact and Student Scene) 40
AUERBACHS WINE-CELLAR IN LEIPZIG 53
WITCH'S KITCHEN (Rejuvenation) 60
A STREET (I: Margarete Accosted) 67
EVENING (Margarete's Room I) 69
PROMENADE (Street II: Mephistopheles' Report) 72
THE NEIGHBOR'S HOUSE (The Story of Schwerdtlein) 73
A STREET (III: False Witness) 77
(Martha's) GARDEN (I: Promenading Couples) 79
A SUMMERHOUSE (Martha's Garden II) 82
FOREST AND CAVE (Faust's Conscience) 83
GRETCHEN'S ROOM (II: Margarete at Her Spinning Wheel) 87
MARTHA'S GARDEN (III: Faust's Credo) 88
AT THE WELL (Gretchen and Lieschen) 91
BY THE RAMPARTS (Gretchen's Prayer) 92
NIGHT (Street IV: Valentine's Death) 93
CATHEDRAL (Mass, with Organ and Choir) 97
WALPURGIS NIGHT (Faust on the Brocken) 99
WALPURGIS NIGHT'S DREAM (Intermezzo) 108
AN EXPANSE OF OPEN COUNTRY (Faust's Rage) 112
NIGHT: OPEN FIELDS (The Gibbet) 114
PRISON (Margarete's Death) 114

PART TWO, in Five Acts
Act I
A PLEASANT LANDSCAPE (Faust's Recovery) 121
AN IMPERIAL PALACE
THE THRONE ROOM (Council of State) 124
A GREAT HALL (Masquerade and Faust's Masque) 132
A GARDEN (Benefits of Paper Money) 154
A DARK GALLERY (The Mothers) 158
BRIGHTLY LI T ROOMS (Waiting for Faust) 162
KNIGHTS' HALL (The Rape of Helen) 163
Act II
A HIGH-VAULTED, NARROW GOTHIC ROOM (Faust's Study IV) 169
LABORATORY (Creation of Homunculus) 175
CLASSICAL WALPURGIS NIGHT 180
The Pharsalian Fields 180 (Erichtho and the Aëronauts 180 • By the Sphinxes 181 • Peneus and Nymphs 186 • Faust, Chiron, and Manto 187 • Again by the Upper Peneus: Seismos' Mountain 191 • Mephistopheles and the Lamiae 196 • Anaxagoras, Thales, and Homunculus 200 • The Phorcides 202) Rocky Inlets of the Aegean Sea 204 (Nereus 206 • Proteus 209 • Galatea 214 • Homunculus merges with the sea 215)

Act III (Helen: Classico-Romantic Phantasmagoria. An Intermezzo)
BEFORE MENELAUS' PALACE AT SPARTA (Helen's Flight) 216
INNER COURTYARD OF A CASTLE (The Wooing and Defense of Helen) 231
A SHADED GROVE (The Life and Death of Euphorion) 241

Act IV
HIGH MOUNTAINS 254 (Margarete Remembered 254 • Faust's Great Plan 256 • The Emperor in Danger 258 • Mephistopheles' Three Mighty Men 260)
ON A FOOTHILL (Defeat of the Anti-Emperor) 261
THE ANTI-EMPEROR'S TENT (Rewards of Victory) 272

Act V
A BROAD LANDSCAPE (Baucis and Philemon) 279
FAUST'S PALACE
BEFORE THE PALACE 281 (Faust's Discontent 281 • The Destruction of Baucis, Philemon and Their Guest 285)
FAUST ON THE BALCONY 286 (Mephistopheles' Report 286 • Four Gray Women in the Courtyard 287)
WITHIN THE PALACE (Care, and the Blinding of Faust) 288
THE LARGE OUTER COURTYARD 290 (Faust's Death and Interment 292 • Mephistopheles Defeated 295)
MOUNTAIN GORGES (Faust's Vision of Heaven and His Reunion with Margarete) 299

Chronology of the Composition of Faust 306
Goethe's Faust and the Present Translation 307
Bibliographical Note 314
Explanatory Notes 315