ENGL 3413: World Literature

John M. Mercer, Professor of English

Northeastern State University, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma

Study Guide 11: Goethe, Tolstoy

Revised 11-10-08

                                                                                                                                                           

Romantic Period

In class we will discuss how the values of the Romantic Period contrast with those of the Enlightenment, which immediately preceded it.  Be able to explain how the values of the Romantic Period apply to Goethe’s Faust, the only Romantic work we’re studying in this class.

 

Enlightenment (ca. 1660-1770)             Romantic Period (ca. 1770-1830)

upper-class characters                                      lower- or middle-class characters

urban                                                                rural [pages 2177, 2183]         

order (physical science, math)   progress, struggle (biological evolution) [2195, line  230]

absolute truth                                                    relative, subjective truth

universality of human nature                               particulars of physical nature

conventional society                                          extraordinary, creative individual [pages 2168-69]        

reason                                                              emotions (esp. melancholy, romantic love) and imagination

 

Goethe

  1. What are the years of Goethe’s birth and death?  His adult life spans the entire Romantic Period.  The year of his death is often used as the ending date of the Romantic Period.
  2. In what country did Goethe live?  He is considered to be the greatest writer this country ever produced.    
  3. In what language did Goethe write?  He is considered to be the greatest writer in this language.
  4. In what literary period did he write?  He is considered to be the most characteristic writer of this period in any language.
  5. What is Sturm und Drang?  How does it relate to the Romantic Period?  to Goethe?

 

Origins of the Faust Story

Many old legends concern a man who sells his soul to the devil for demonic power.  Such legends still inspire works written today in many different genres.

  1. Extra credit: List as many different songs, short stories, novels, plays, or films, etc., as you can that are about someone who sells his or her soul to, or makes a deal with, the devil. Explain how each work (or any that you want to discuss) fits this scenario and is different from Faust. 

 

In the 16th century, these legends were linked to the life of the real person Dr. John Faustus, a German charlatan who studied magic and traveled around performing tricks.  Many believed he performed his magic through supernatural (evil) power.  After his death in 1538, stories about him were collected into the “Faust-book,” which was translated into English and published in 1587 under the title The History of Dr. John Faustus.  This became a primary source for later writers.

 

Famous Treatments of the Faust Story

 

Background for Goethe’s Faust

Goethe wrote Faust over a period of 57 years, 1774-1831.

 

Faust, Part I, published in 1808, has been classified as all of the following genres.  In class we will discuss the appropriateness of each label:

The assigned reading from the textbook is from the very beginning of the work.  The rest of Faust, Part I, includes the following significant episodes:

 

Faust, Part II, published in 1831 or 1833, is highly episodic, philosophical, and difficult, even incoherent; it is not capable of stage production.  In the end, Faust finally, for the first time, is content and fulfilled, wishing this moment could last. 

  1. What finally brings Faust contentment?  (See textbook’s introduction to Goethe.)

Technically, Mephistopheles has won his wager with Faust; but God, seeing that Faust has found happiness only in helping others, saves him from hell and takes him to heaven. This is a thoroughly “romantic” (idealistic) ending.

  1. Prior knowledge or extra-credit research (to be discussed in class): How does Christopher Marlowe’s play Dr. Faustus differ from Goethe’s Faust in each of the following ways:
    1. The nature of the deal between Faust and the devil
    2. The way Faust uses the power he gets from the devil
    3. The eternal destiny of Faust’s soul

 

Required Reading from Faust

  1. Where does the Prologue take place?
  2. On what book of the Old Testament are the events of the Prologue based? On what particular story?
  3. Who is Mephistopheles?  Surprisingly, the Lord seems rather fond of Mephistopheles.  What does the Lord say he likes about Mephistopheles?
  4. What pact or agreement does the Lord make with Mephistopheles (2163b-64t)?
  5. After the Prologue, the opening scene of Part I (beginning 2164b) is typical of the Romantic Period.
    1. At what time of day does the scene take place?
    2. What is the style of architecture in the setting?  With what historical period is this architecture associated?
    3. What is Faust’s mood?
  6. Why does Faust conjure evil spirits (that is, engage in black magic)?
  7. What is Wagner’s relationship to Faust?  How is Wagner’s name pronounced in German?
  8. What is in “that bottle” (2172, line 335)?  What prevents Faust from drinking its contents (2173m)?  What holiday is it?
  9. Where do Faust and Wagner go walking?  How does Faust feel in this environment?   
  10. The peasants speak to Faust about his father.  What was his father’s occupation?  How do the peasants judge his father’s success in this occupation?  How does Faust judge his father’s success (2180)?
  11. How does Mephistopheles get into Faust’s home?
  12. When Mephistopheles appears to Faust in human form, how is he dressed?
  13. What pact or wager do Mephistopheles and Faust make with each other (2193-94)? Faust is confident that he will never feel HOW?
  14. What is meant by the line “For restless activity proves a man” (2195, line 230)?

 

Realism

Realism was an important, but not the only, literary movement from 1850 to 1900.  To some extent, it was a reaction against Romanticism.

  1. Realism as a literary movement should not be confused with verisimilitude, a kind of realism present to some extent in all great literature.  What is verisimilitude?  What examples of verisimilitude can you identify in works we have previously studied?
  2. Realism was widespread in Europe and North America.  Identify the nationality of each of the following Realistic writers:
    1. Gustav Flaubert
    2. Feodor Dostoevski (Dostoyevsky), Leo Tolstoy
    3. Charles Dickens
    4. Henry James, William Dean Howells, Edith Wharton
    5. Henrik Ibsen

Realistic works were written primarily in fiction (short story, novelette or novella, and novel) but also in drama.

  1. In class we will discuss the following important characteristics of Realism.  To what extent does each trait apply to Tolstoy’s The Death of Iván Ilyich?
    1. middle-class characters
    2. objective description of the details of contemporary life
    3. inclusion of unpleasant truths (as opposed to Romanticism, which Realists believed presented life too idealistically)
    4. social criticism
  2. What does Tolstoy’s story criticize about each of the following aspects of Russian middle-class society of the late 19th century?
    1. Marriage and family relationships
    2. Relationships with friends and colleagues
    3. Materialism
    4. Lawyers, judges, courts
    5. Doctors, the efficacy of medicine
    6. Religion, the Russian Orthodox Church
    7. Treatment of the dying; funeral customs

 

Tolstoy

  1. What was Tolstoy’s social class?  What social class, however, did he most admire?  Why?
  2. In what ways was Tolstoy’s life unconventional and eccentric? 
  3. Extra-credit video:  Watch Biography: “Tolstoy,” on reserve in the library.  This fascinating program contains actual film footage of Tolstoy.
  4. On the whole Tolstoy is a Realist, but his works, including The Death of Iván Ilyich, exhibit some traits of Romanticism, such as an idealistic view of children and of peasants. According to the textbook’s introduction to Tolstoy, who are the only two characters in the story who treat the dying Iván with compassion and sincerity?  Why do they behave differently from the other characters?

 

The Death of Iván Ilyich

By genre, The Death of Iván Ilyich is a novelette or novella, intermediate in length between a short story and a novel.  (It is 45 pages long and divided into chapters.)

 

  1. What is Iván Ilyich’s social class?  How can you tell? 
  2. Before his illness, what are Ivan’s most salient character traits? What values are most important to him?  How does his morality compare with others of his social class?
  3. The narrator frequently mentions (e.g., 2445-46, 2450) that Iván lives for “pleasure” and “propriety.”  What do these terms mean?  Give specific examples of his acting on these values.   
  4. Iván’s illness provides him, as it does for many people facing serious illness and death, with an opportunity for spiritual growth.  Find and explain each of the following steps in Iván’s “conversion” or growth:
    1. He examines his past life.
    2. He denies that he’s done anything wrong; he believes he’s always acted with   propriety.
    3. He recognizes that there was more goodness in his life when he was very young, that his values have declined over the years.                       
    4. He begins to acknowledge the wrongness of his life (2474).
    5. Still in doubt about his past life, he takes Communion to please his wife.
    6. He finally acknowledges the wrongness of his past life (2475).
    7. He feels and shows compassion for his son and his wife (2475).                                   
    8. He sees that death is Light (2476).
  5. Generations before Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s research concerning the stages of death or grief experienced by the terminally ill, Tolstoy represents Iván Ilyich as experiencing all five of Kübler-Ross’s stages.  Give specific examples of how Ivan experiences each of the following stages:
    1. Denial: refusing to accept that he is seriously ill or dying
    2. Anger: lashing out at others when he begins to accept the imminence of death
    3. Bargaining: convincing himself that if he will just follow a particular course of action, everything will be OK
    4. Depression: withdrawing from the world in despair when he recognizes that all the above strategies have failed and he is indeed dying
    5. Acceptance: discovering that his death will actually be beneficial for himself and others
  6. Extra-credit reading: Read and respond to Y. J. Dayananda’s article “The Death of Iván Ilyich: A Psychological Study On Death and Dying,” available in the reserve drawer in the library.  This article applies Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s stages of grief to The Death of Iván Ilyich.
  7. What does Iván’s best friend Peter Ivánovich really want to be doing on the night of Ivan's funeral?
  8. When Iván goes job-hunting in St. Petersburg, what is the one and only criterion he looks for in a new job?
  9. How does Iván injure himself? What is ironic about this?
  10. After Iván gets his new job in St. Petersburg and before his family joins him, what is his one obsession?
  11. What medical diagnoses (plural) are given for Iván’s disease?  How valid are these diagnoses?
  12. What causes Iván to become suddenly aware of the deterioration of his physical appearance?
  13. What does Iván like the butler's assistant Gerasim to do to ease his pain?
  14. What makes Iván so angry about his family’s behavior toward him?
  15. What is Iván’s first—and last—act of real concern for others?
  16. How does the dying Iván picture death?  How does this picture change?