From Nietzsche’s Favourite Book: Goethe’s Advice to Young Artists

‘Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.’ ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe | Photo by the author.

‘The best German book there is.’

~ Nietzsche on Eckermann’s Conversations with Goethe.

Italy has Dante, England has Shakespeare, but Germany has — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

The former two, however, dedicated their lives almost exclusively to writing, whereas Goethe was an inborn polymath.

One can joke and say that if Dante and Da Vinci had a son, he definitely would have resembled Goethe in character.

Goethe shared Dante’s literary talent and Da Vinci’s intense curiosity. His tragic play Faust is as ingrained into the German psyche as Dante’s Divine Comedy is ingrained in the Italian.

His scientific investigations delved into architecture, colour, geology, morphology, and botany.

Goethe witnessed historical events that continue to echo in our century.

In a letter to a friend he wrote:

“I was born at a time when the most momentous world events were taking place…I was a living witness to the Seven Years’ War, then a separation of America from Britain, then the French Revolution, and finally the whole Napoleonic era, until the downfall of that heroic figure..”