ato Goethe’s Fantasies about the Orient Walter Veit Monash University Exotisch, which entered the German language only in the eighteenth cen- tury,’ was used by Goethe as a way of referring to artificially introduced exogenous plants and animals, and he disregarded its etymological mean- ing of “extraordinarily strange and unknown.” That meaning, however, explains why “exotic” had resonances similar to those of “Oriental.” Heyse’s Fremdwirterbuch [Dictionary of Foreign Words] (1859) shows that it was in the nineteenth century that the meanings of these words became colored by judgmental attitudes toward the Orient—at opposite extremes, either rejection of or enthusiasm for everything foreign. Goethe's relationship to the Orient (here defined as including the Near East) was marked by a contradictory attitude. On the one hand, he was drawn to Oriental subjects during his whole career. Already among the famous hymnic poetry of his youth we find a poem entitled “Mahomets-Gesang” [“Mohammed’s song”] (1774)? some of the best poems of Goethe's later years are to be found in the collection entitled West-Ostlicher Divan | West-Eastern Divan] (1815); and his Orientalism con- tinued in two shorter lyrical sequences, the Indian trilogy Paria (1824), and the Chinesisch-deutschen Jahres- und Tageszeiten | Chinese-German Seasons and Times of Day] (1830). On the other hand, Goethe expressed a marked dislike for the Orient because he experienced it as a threat to his aesthetic sensibility. In any case, during the seven years between 1808 and 1815, Goethe moved away from the firm norms of classical antiquity that he had Eighteenth-Century Life Volume 26, Number 3, Fall 2002 © 2002 by The College of William & Mary 104Goethe's Fantasies about the Orient 766 himself helped to make popular in earlier years. Oriental fluidity is expressed, for instance, in the poem “Lied und Gebilde” [“Song and For- mation”] from the Divan: Mag der Grieche seinen Thon May the Greek his clay Zu Gestalten driicken, Press into forms, ‘An der eignen Hinde Sohn Through the son of his hands Steigern sein Entziicken, Increase his delight. Aber uns ist wonnereich But for us it is to be rich in joy In den Euphrat greifen, Grasping into the Euphrates, Und im flissgen Element And in the liquid element Hin und wider schweifen. Roaming to and fro. Lascht ich so der Seele Brand Quench I thus the fire of the soul, Lied es wird erschallen; Song will ring out; Schopft des Dichters reine Hand Scooped by the poet's pure hand, Wasser wird sich ballen. Water balls into a fist. 3 Leaving other important aspects aside, it is possible to argue that Goethe's turn toward the Orient was a response to the political, social, and intellectual turmoil in Europe in the wake of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. In a letter to the Russian Count Uwarow (18 May 1818) concerning the genesis of the Divan, Goethe reminisces: “In terrible and unbearable times when I could not physically remove myself, I fled into those regions where my ideals and also my heart is. My only consola- tion was to sip at Chiser’s well [Goethe's metaphor for poetic inspiration and spiritual fulfillment]. Indeed, the Napoleonic wars brought the Near East much closer to European intellectuals and forced them to expand their view beyond the biblical Holy Land. Published reports, drawings, charts, and collections brought back by scholars and scientists attached to the army during the Egyptian campaign of 1798 that not only offered an enormous increase of factual knowledge about Egypt, but also reflected a new method of collecting it.’ It represents one of the first, if not the first, large-scale research expeditions undertaken by any nation as a state enter prise, and it matches in significance the three journeys into the Pacific by Captain Cook and his companions some thirty years earlier, Whereas the accounts of Bougainville’s and Cook's voyages fuelled the fashion for the Pacific, the Egyptian venture gave rise to a type of exoticism with a specifi- cally Oriental flavor.6 Goethe was himself attracted to this vogue for Orientalism. In the166 — Eighteenth-Century Life Morgenblatt fiir gebildete Stande [Morning Herald for Cultured Audiences] (24 February 1816), therefore, he offers the following comments concerning the opening poem of the Divan, “Hegire”: “The poet considers himself a traveler. He has already arrived in the Orient. He delights in the customs, habits, objects, religious beliefs, and opinions: indeed, he does not counter- mand the suspicion that he is a Muslim himself.’ A number of excellent critical interpretations of the Divan explain that Goethe wished to over- come the national boundaries of his time and to lay the foundation for a Weltliteratur by immersing himself in mainly Persian literature. However, the question remains why Goethe should have shown such a deep interest in the Orient, surrounding himself with specialists in practically every field of knowledge concerning Asia and the Near East. My investigation of the intellectual background of Goethe's poetry leads me to conclude that the Orient came to symbolize the cradle of civilization, where he hoped to dis- cover the origins of language and poetry. Furthermore, Goethe's exoticism was used to critique the superficiality and hypocritical foundations of European culture. Goethe's interest in medieval Persian writers such as Firdausi, Rumi, Sadi, and Hafis,? whose works had gradually disappeared from Western in of consciousness, was triggered by his idea that they embody the orig poetry, or indeed the origin of European civilization. He did not devalue the classical heritage or disavow his earlier work, but by deliberately immersing himself in a different culture he hoped to answer one of the most pervasive questions of his life: how can the intrinsic need for one’s own personal fulfillment be reconciled with the need for self-fulfillment of others? ‘Travel How much did Goethe know about the non-European world? Although the Americas appear frequently in his published letters, diaries, and con- versations, there are gaps in that interest between 1813 and 1820, when Goethe was preoccupied with the Orient, about which, it seems, he was much better informed. ‘Travel literature formed a significant part of Goethe's library," and the list of travel and related titles mentioned in his letters and diaries is even more extensive. He was also familiar with manyGoethe's Fantasies about the Orient —6'7 historical scholarly works on the Orient— from Turkey, Egypt, and Persia, to China and Japan—and from 1808 he reread time and again Marco Polo's travels to China. In his explanatory notes on the Divan, Goethe commented extensively on Polo, as well as on early travelers, imaginary or real, including John Mandeville, Pietro della Valle, Adam Olearius, Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, and Jean Chevalier de Chardin. He also read Fernio Mendes Pinto’s Pere- grinagao on Arabia, India, Ceylon, China, and Japan— presumably in the German translation of 1671 with its rich illustrations. He owned the Ger- man editions of the Dutchman Olfert Dapper’s 1681 compilation of accounts of travels in Turkey, Syria, Persia, India, and China. He probably also read Frangois Bernier’s factual Auffgezeichnete Beobachtungen, was sich im Reiche des Grossen Mogols begeben [Recorded Observations in the King- dom of the Great Mogul].' Although the name does not appear in his let- ters or conversations, Goethe would also have been familiar with Carsten Niebuhr’s Beschreibung von Arabien [Travels in Arabia] as well as Pierre Sonnerat’s Voyage dans les Indes orientales et a la Chine, which he mentioned in an important draft letter of February 1811 to the Russian count S. S. Uwarow. He thanked the count for having instilled in him the love of the Vedas, the ancient Indian hymns.'? Goethe's own library contained the translation of Constantin Frangois de Chasseboeuf Volney’s Voyage en Egypte et en Syrie. He was similarly informed about the Pacific through Georg Forster's German translation of Louis-Antoine de Bougainville’s Vay- age autour du monde, Georg Forster and Johann Friedrich Schiller’s transla- tions of John Hawkesworth’s compilations, and another translation of Hawkesworth by his friend Johann Heinrich Merck, but most directly through conversations with Forster himself and by reading Forster's own Reise um die Welt mit Captain Cook (Voyage around the World with Captain Cook]. Other sources of geographical and ethnographic information included Christoph Meiners's standard ethnographic work on the different human natures in Asia and the islands of the Pacific, Friedrich Ludwig Walther’s on cannibalism and human sacrifices,"4 and reviews of publica- tions on journeys of discovery and exploration in several periodicals, such as the Ethnographisches Archiv, Allgemeine geographische Ephemeriden, and Der Teutsche Merkur. Goethe's interest in the geography, ethnography, botany, and mineral- ogy of the Orient did not diminish after the Divan. He closely followed108 — Eighteonth- Century Life the travels and explorations of Alexander von Humboldt, whose scientific work he considered to be the completion of his own; but whereas Hum- boldt explored the Americas, Goethe's attention remained on the East. With keen interest he read Moritz von Kotzebue’s journey through Asia, published in Weimar in 1818; the translation of John Davy’s An Account of the Interior of Ceylon, and of its Inhabitants, and many other works about travel and exploration." ‘There can be little doubt that the reports from Napoleon's expedition into Egypt prompted a flood of information that changed the European perception of the Near East right down to matters of fashion: Egyptoma- nia was one of the consequences. Sifting through numerous works, Goethe assembled the facts and images that would eventually find their way into the fabric of the poetry of the Divan and other poems. At the same time, he gave full accounts of them in the “Notes,’ adding penetrating theoreti- cal consideration that made them one of the first serious ethnographic studies. In short, Goethe became a traveler again as he had been a traveler during the two years of his escape to Italy (1786-88). That journey had resulted in one of the most important travel accounts in the German lan- guage, his Ialienische Reise [Italian Journey], which —as Sulpiz, Boi: reported after a conversation with Goethe on 3 August 1815—he worked on while starting to write the Divan. They share the same critical mood that expressed “onesideness; hatred of everything German; Gothic archi- ree tecture; the climate.” But in the Divan his journey is imaginary, and one of a special kind. He travels as the poet who yearns to experience the world beyond the confines of Weimar and German-speaking Europe. His attempt to do so explains why the first book of the Divan is preoccupied with ques- tions concerning the poet and his craft, as is demonstrated by the poem “Lied und Gebilde.” Goethe’s imaginary travels through the Orient may capture the essence of the foreign in his work and world and for this reason are not fic~ tional in the traditional sense of the word. Paola Mildonian calls the Divan a “voyage philosophique”: I would prefer the phrase “voyage spirituelle.” Collecting all the information he could, he became one of the first “arm- chair ethnographers”—similar to James Frazer of the Golden Bough and others— compiling materials from foreign lands and then structuring and interpreting them according to his own ideas. Four of the most prominent themes in the 196 poems of the Divan first published with “Notes” in 1819~ 20, and the 239 poems in the final version of 1827 (in vol. 5 of the Voll-Goethe's Fantasies about the Orient 169 standige Ausgabe letzter Hand [Final Complete Authorized Edition)), are love, the poet's craft, the poet's relationship to the social and political world, and the self’s relation to the foreign and unfamiliar. Mysticism— another overt theme— pervades the poem inasmuch as Goethe is emulat- ing the Persian poets. In some texts he adopts the Oriental perspective in order to critique German and European culture and to think about the origin of ci tion. In 1817 he published a short but important essay on the philosophy of history in his “Geistesepochen/ in which the term Urzeif (primordial time) figures prominently (HA, 12:298-300). In this essay, Goethe set out, as did some early Orientalists of his day, to find the origin of European culture in the exotic Orient. As in the biblical stories of the creation of the cosmos the topos of space—Heaven, Earth, Paradise— comes to replace that of time—Origin, Beginning, and End. But what is new about Goethe's topos of space? liza~ Light from the East Goethe introduces and welds together nearly all the themes and topoi of the Divan in the introductory poem “Hegira”; to those mentioned above he adds: political turmoil, travel, metamorphosis, bucolic life, and Orien- tal origin (GW, 2:7-8). The lyrical “I” of the ego, the poet, identifies with Mohammed, whose flight from Mecca to Medina—like the poet Hafis’s search for the Word that bestows eternal life—is an analogy for Goethe's search. Nord und West und Siid zersplittern, Throne bersten, Reiche zittern, Flichte du, im reinen Osten Patriarchenluft zu kosten; North and West and South are splintering, Thrones are bursting, realms are shivering, Take your flight, in the pure East You will taste the air of patriarchs; Unter Lieben, Trinken, Singen Soll dich Chisers Quell verjtingen. Dort, im Reinen und im Rechten, Will ich menschlichen Geschlechten In des Ursprungs Tiefe dringen, Wo sie noch von Gott empfingen While loving, drinking, singing Chiser’s fountain shall rejuvenate you. ‘There, in what is pure and right, 1 will penetrate into the depth Of the origin of human generations, Where they received from God170 Kighteenth-Century Life HimmelsIehr in Erdensprachen, Und sich nicht den Kopf zerbrachen. Wo sie Vater hoch verehrten, Jeden fremden Dienst verwehrten; Will mich freun der Jugendschranke: Glaube weit, eng der Gedanke, Wie das Wort so wichtig dort war, Weil es ein gesprochen Wort war. Will mich unter Hirten mischen, ‘An Oasen mich erfrischen, Wenn mit Karawanen wandle, Shawl, Kaffee und Moschus handle; Jeden Pfad will ich betreten Von den Wiisten zu den Stidten. Basen Feldweg auf und nieder Trosten, Hafis, deine Lieder, Wenn der Fithrer voll Entziicken Von des Maultiers hohem Riicken Singt, die Sterne au erwecken Und die Rauber zu erschrecken. Will in Badern und in Schenken, Heilger Hafis, dein gedenken; Wenn den Schleier Liebchen liiftet, Schiittelnd Ambralocken diiftet. Ja des Dichters Licbefliistern Mache selbst die Huris listern Wollet ihr ihm dies beneiden, Oder etwa gar verleiden, Wisset nur, dag Dichterworte Um des Paradieses Pforte Immer leise klopfend schweben, Sich erbittend ewges Leben. Heaven's teaching in earth's languages, And did not rack their brains Where they venerated their forefathers, Rejected any foreign service; I will enjoy the barriers to youth: Wide is faith, narrow thought. ‘The Word was so important there, Because it was the spoken Word. I will mingle with herdsmen, Refresh myself in oases, When I wander with caravans, in shawls, coffee and musk; I shall walk every path From the deserts to the ci Up and down dangerous side-roads Your songs, Hafis, are consoling, When the leader fall of joy From the high back of his mule Sings to wake the stars And to frighten the robbers. In baths and inns, Saint Hafis, Twill think of you; When my lover lifts her veil, Shaking her fragrant locks of ambergris. Truly, the poet's love whispering Should even make Huris lusty. Ifyou wanted to begrudge him all this, Or even to make him tire of it, You should know that poet's words Always hover softly knocking Begging for eternal life. To summarize, Goethe's journey is to the “pure East” of the Oriental “patri- archs,’ the realm of the “pure and right,’ to the prophet Chiser’s fountain, to the “depth” of human origins and the unmediated presence of the divine and the divine word prior to any intellectual analysis. Goethe had prepared himself meticulously for his travels, immersing himself in “Orientalism,” as he called it twice in his conversations with Sulpiz Boisserée. He gave an extensive account of his preparatory historiGoethe's Fantasies about the Orient 777 cal, biographical, and philosophical studies for the Divan not only in his letters, diaries, and reported conversations, but also in the appended “Noten und Abhandlungen zu besserem Verstiindnis des West-éstlichen Divans” [Notes and papers for a better understanding of the West-Eastern divan]. The title makes it clear that Goethe did not expect that his readers would follow him easily. However, he thought of the Divan as an innovative and paradigmatic work in which poetic creation and scholarly research entered into a close—if not dialectic— cooperation that presupposed and gener- ated the other. In these “notes,’ Goethe generously acknowledged the formative contribution of such Orientalists as Sir William Jones, Antoine Silvestre de Sacy (the French doyen of Oriental studies), and his disciples in Austria and Germany—Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, Heinrich Friedrich von Diez, and Johann Gottfried Ludwig Kosegarten."” In the introduction to his Denkwiirdigheiten von Asien [Noteworthy Asian Curiosities], published three years after Othmar Frank’s Das Licht von Orient [Light from the Orient],'® to which I shall turn later, von Diez— a gifted linguist who gained first-hand experience of the Near East while being posted as Prussian envoy in Constantinople— explains the purpose of his project: “To learn of human feelings and thoughts, customs and principles, knowledge and sciences, virtues and vices. That in turn enables us to judge how a people's education, religion, and government made it good or bad; whether its teaching, arts, and sciences made it intelligent; and how it became happy or unhappy in its whole way of being, thinking, and acting. These are the things we must observe in humanity in order to apply them to our own purposes” (iv). It is toward Asia that von Diez also turns his attention because “Asia in particular, as the cradle of the whole human genus, can never cease to incite the curiosity of those who wish to go back to the origin of all formative influences on German identity? and “if we wish to learn of other knowledge and discoveries that could be use- ful for us, we have to follow them where at all times the most intelligent peoples have lived.” Even the ancient Greeks had derived some of their knowledge from the East; many had journeyed to the East and—on the evidence of Plato— had become philosophers through the Orient. Fortu- nately, Asia over many thousands of years has preserved much from which to learn about earlier times (iv—ix). The main points of the introduction to the Noteworthy Asian Curiosi- ties are already spelled out in von Diez’s letters to Goethe,!” a fact of par-772 Bighteenth-Century Life ticular importance for the chronology of the development of Goethe’s thoughts. In his first letter of 12 July 1815, von Diez considered the neces- sity of changing the unfavorable Western perception of Orientals. He points out that he has long been of the opinion that the Orientals and Occidentals, as much as they may differ from each other, can be brought together only because understanding will travel to all countries on Earth and will remain traveling to the end of the world in order to impress on the spirit of the inhabitants of each nation a certain individual character and, in return, receive it from them, just as the physical nature takes on its own character in every part of the world and imparts to the faces of human beings special forms and traces, often even different colors. In short, the world is designed for spiritual differentiation the search for uniform appearance and form in all arts and sciences and in all climes would amount to demanding that all peoples on Earth should have the same skin color and physiognomy. .. . An old Ottoman once told me that the human mind that has experienced much and thought still more about it, strives everywhere toward the same goals: only the paths to get there differ with different peoples. It is therefore important that the Orientals are presented as they are without caring about idiots who want to have [their literature} translated as if they had thought and written in the German language. For as easy as it may be for these so-called translators to think and write [about] themselves, it really means to distort and betray the Orientals because they have not thought and written in German. (“Briefwechsel” 26) In the same letter, von Diez also says that he would be flattered if the “knowledge he has endeavored to gain about the inhabitants of the father- land of humanity” could answer any questions Goethe might have about them. Not only did von Diez emphasize the Asian origin of European intelligence, he also discussed critically the merits of travel accounts, past and present, most of which were, in his opinion, of little value because “they are more interested in amusing and entertaining the reader than in usefulness for science.” Marco Polo and Chardin were exceptions because they had learned the languages of the exotic regions they described. Beyond linguistic ignorance, von Diez bemoaned the superficiality and methodological ineptitude of most travel accounts: Ie ig to such travels the right spirit of observation, and itis necessary to divest oneself of a prejudiced European love of self—rare and difficult matters. How many travelers have condemned a whole nation only because some children have shown their dislike of them, or becaus necessary to b someGoethe's Fantasies about the Orient 478 adults have not treated them according to what they thought was due their social status; or because the morality and piety of the Asians and their indifference toward foreigners have offended them; or because the government did not support the ulterior motives with which the travelers had come into the country! (13) Von Diez suggests that their own books are the best way to learn of Asians, and that practically all sciences have benefited from their knowledge. He concludes that “those who will read these writings attentively will receive from them much light about the Orient and would gain even more if their translators understood the country enough to annotate the text usefully for the European reader.” At this stage Goethe's role in the history of European imperialism and colonialism should be scrutinized, and it makes sense to review how he enters the debates around Orientalism. Unfortunately, I do not have the space to contrast in detail von Diez’s essay with Edward Said’s modern response to the Western European, particularly the French and English, interests in the Orient during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; but let me mention that Said’s Orientalism uses Goethe's engagement with the Orient as a way of launching his largely justified criticism of the ideologies of the emerging colonial powers in the Orient.2! He argues that Goethe— like everybody else in Europe— adopted an attitude toward the Orient that was implicitly informed by the idea of European superiority. Although Said concedes that neither Goethe nor the German states during his time were interested in colonial adventure, he argues that they were part of the emerging intellectual community that had just discovered the idea that there were families of languages, such as the family of Indo-European lan- guages. Said concludes, “what German Orientalism had in common with Anglo-French and American Orientalism was a kind of intellectual author- ity over the Orient. . .. Middle East experts can still draw on the vestiges of Orientalism’s intellectual position in nineteenth-century Europe” (18). Georg Stauth has argued that Said’s construction of Orientalism rests on the assumption “that the occidental human sciences founded modern rationalism by negatively delimiting Oriental, specifically Islamic civiliza- tion, and that this process of cultural delimitation has its parallel in the colonial domination of Oriental peoples.” It ought to be mentioned at this point that the German Orientalists recognized significant distinctions among the different cultures and lan- guages of Turkey, Morocco, India, China, and Japan. We remember that174 — Bighteenth-Century Life Said himself admits to not knowing enough about early German Oriental- ists, or about Goethe. Nor does he seem to know about von Diez’s writ- ings, or those by the lesser known Othmar Frank, both of whom had stud- ied in Paris with the doyen of Oriental studies specializing in Arabic, Antoine Silvestre de Sacy. Worse, he does not seem to be aware that Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s Botschaft des Ostens [Message of the East] of 1922, subti- tled Als Antwort auf Geothe’s West-Ostlichen Divan [An Answer to Goethe’ West-Eastern Divan], had already recognized the productive cross-cultural dimension of Goethe's Orientalism.?* Ina speech in Weimar in July 2000, Sejjed Mohammed Chatami, president of Iran, referred to Iqbal’s homage to Goethe as an example of the necessity of dialogue between West and East. Chatami argued that Goethe's studies of the East in general, and the publication of his Divan in particular, instigated a turning point in intellectual East-West relations. Reminding the audience of the more expressive Arabic title of the poem, which is translatable as The Eastern Collection of the Western Author, he argues that “the great German poet simply did not understand the East and the West as two geographical regions but treated them as opposite philosophical and cultural poles; as a poet of the West he tried to open a dialogue with the Orient and, in particular, with its great intellectual and cultural luminaries. Iranian culture and some of its eminent representatives play a special role in Goethe’s understanding,” And among the eminent, the central figure is Hafis: Hafis is a symbol of Islamic-Iranian thought and identity. He is the “voice of the supersensuall” He has a secure and internal relationship to the Koran and to revelations. His perceptions and his feelings reflect the supersensual in our culture. He is a master of the supersensual, of the hidden, Therefore, he plays the role of the prophet in our daily life. Every Iranian discovers in Hafis an undiscovered part of his cultural memory. Even through the veil of approximating translations, Goethe understood “the language of the supersensual” and entered into a relationship with it, Obviously, this demonstrates Goethe's genius. But it reveals the aims of the dialogue between different cultures as well as the means of obtaining them. As if directing his remarks at Said’s contentions, Chatami concludes his observations on Goethe with the following remarks: “In Goethe's West- Eastern Divan there are no signs of colonialistic intentions and hegemonicGoethe's Fantasies about the Orient 776 interests which have, unfortunately, frequently accompanied Western pol- itics in the last centuries. In it the Western poet goes beyond just getting- to-know the ‘other’ and tries to enter into a dialogue with him. .. . This dialogue between Goethe and Hafis on the one hand, and Goethe and Iqbal on the other, is an eminently fruitful dialogue between cultures and civilizations.” Renunciation After the quest for the Golden Age of Classical Antiquity and for the Judeo-Christian Paradise, Goethe and his pan-European contemporaries searched for the original of their own world. For German Romantic writ- ers such as Novalis, it was the world of the Blue Flower or the Holy Grail of the Middle Ages; Friedrich Schlegel found it in India; the philologist Franz Bopp sought to discover and reconstruct the original Ur-sprache (mother tongue) of the (later so-called) Indo-Germanic tribes; Bougainville, Cook, and the Forsters found primitive man on remote Pacific islands; and a short while later Alexander von Humboldt and Charles Darwin set out to discover the principles of origin governing the Earth and all living things on it. In short, the search for the original world did not occur only in Romantic poetry but was one of the distinct preoccupations at the turn from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, from the Age of Enlighten- ment and Revolution to Romanticism. Alain Corbin has recently called the quest for origins an “obsession” of the age.’ It began with Gianbattista Vico and continued with Johann Gottfried Herder; however, as Friedrich Meinecke and Isaiah Berlin have shown, Goethe is one of the protagonists in this process. In Goethe's own words: “The most important characteristic of the Oriental art of poetry is what we Germans call Spirit, that is, the dominant aspect of what guides us; here the rest of the other elements in [our] character are united without any one of them coming to the fore and maintaining a special right” (HA, 2:165). Goethe emphasized the close relationship between the poetics of the Oriental poets and his own. It seems that he wanted to flee from the present— including, of course, the barbarism of the Napoleonic wars pre- sented in the “Buch des Timur” [“Book of Timur”] of the Divan — into the primitivism of the original world.176° — Eighteonth-Century Life A short remark in his notes on the “Buch der Betrachtungen” [“Book of Contemplation”) points to an underlying theme that Chatami noticed: ‘The Book of Contemplation grows langer every day for the one who dwells in the Orient; for there all is contemplation, surging back and forth between the sensual and the trans-sensual without choosing one or the other. Such contemplation brings us to the strangest problems of earthly life, which stand immediately and implacably before us and for when facing the accidental and in facing providence with its inscrutable decrees, and force us to express unconditional resignation as the highest political, ethical, and religious principle. (HA, 2:197) s down on our knees In short, juxtaposed to the Occidental principle of unconditional self- creation and self-realization, irrespective of other human beings and their equally justified and sometimes conflicting aspirations, is this Oriental principle of Enésagung (renunciation), which Goethe counted among the many gifts of the Orient in his notes on the “Book of Parables” of the Divan (HA, 2:205ff.). These Oriental parables are organized into “ethical, moral, and ascetic” categories whose contents are “related to the human being per se and to its situation.” Whereas some parables narrate objec~ tively, others demand judgments about good and bad, and others put forth ethical commandments and demand unconditional surrender to divine decrees. Goethe continues, positing that another category of para~ bles might be the “mystical”: “It drives humans out of their previous state of mind—which remains still anxious and oppressing— toward a unifi- cation with God in this life and to a provisional renunciation of those goods whose eventual loss might cause us pain” (HA, 2:205). This is a com- mentary on the second stanza of the poem “Auserwihlte Frauen” [“Cho- sen Women] in the “Buch des Paradieses” [“Book of Paradise”) celebrat- ing Suleika who, in the Islamic tradition, from being Potiphar’s libidinous wife and seductress of Jussuf (Joseph), became a saint of sacred love: “Now, the delight of Paradise / She shines as the jewel of renunciation” (HA, 2:109). In the deep web of images and ideas that is Goethe’s Divan, the theme of renunciation (Entsagung) has subliminal links to both his early and his last works. In fact, it seems that Goethe found in the Oriental travel theme imagery pertinent to overcoming the dangers in the unremitting quest for self-realization. In the Divan spiritual travel to the Orient, to the origin, becomes the argumentative image and metaphor for renunciation, and itGoethe's Fantasies about the Orient 477 projects a conscious and willed self-limitation that accords with the cosmic order. No poem in the whole Divan states more succinctly the result of willed renunciation than “Talismane,’ the introductory poem to the West-East dialogue: Gottes ist der Orient! Tt is God’s Orient! Gortes ist der Okzident! It is God's Occident! Nord- und siidliches Geliinde Northern and southern lands Ruht im Frieden seiner Hinde, Resting in the peace of his hands. (HA, 2:205) This confident sense of peace must not be confused with self-pitying res- ignation. It is a voluntary self-limitation that Goethe saw demonstrated by Hafis— alternative to the destructive self-realization practiced by the political and military genius Napoleon. Goethe used the spiritual travel to the Orient to critique Occidental narcissism. Contrasting, as he already did in “Hegire?’ rationality with sensuality, city with desert, and absolute self-realization with active self-renunciation, he gave the modern quest for origins a new dimension and, therefore, gave Orientalism and exoticism new meanings. Notes 1. See Thomas Schwarz, “‘Die Tropen bin ich!” Der exotistische Diskurs der Jahrhundertwende,’ ed. N. Badenberg et al., AultuRRevolution, 32/33 (Essen: Klartext, 1995), 130. 2. In Goethes Werke, Hamburger Ausgabe (hereafter HA), ed. E. Trunz. 14 vols. (Hamburg: Wegener, 1948), 1:42~44, “Mahomets-Gesang” ["Mohammed’s Song”. See also Katharina Mommsen, Goethe und der Islam (1964; reprint, Frankfurt: Insel, 2001); Goethe und roor Nacht (1960; reprint, Frankfurt: Insel, 1981); and Goethe und die arabische Welt (Frankfurt: Insel, 2001). 3. West-Ostlicher Divan (HA, 2:16). Translations are mine, with the assistance of Peter King. 4+ Goethes Briefe, in Goethes Werke. Weimaret Ausgabe (hererafter WA) Herausgegeben im Auftrag der Grotherzogin Sophie von Sachsen. IV. Abteilung: Goethes Briefe, Bd. 1-50, ed. W. von Biederman et al. (Weimar, 1887~1912), IV, 2:225. 5. Description de Egypte ou Receuil des observations et recherches qui ont été faites en Egypte pendant Vexpedition de larmée frangaise, publié par les ordres de sa majesté Vempereur Napoléon le Grand (Paris: Imprimérie Impériale, 1809). 6. For a discussion of exotic fantasies, see the catalogs for some comprehensive exhibitions in the late twentieth century: Institut fiir Auslandsbeziehungen—178 Eighteenth-Century Life Wiirttembergischer Kunstverein, Exotische WeltenEuropaische Phantasien (Stuttgart: Cantz, 1987); in the same series: Ingrid Hermann, Mythos Tabiti: Siidsee—Traum und Realitit (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 1987), Gereon Sievernich and Hendrick Budde, eds., Europa und der Orient 800-1900 (Giitersloh: Bertelsmann, 1989). See also Jochen Golz, ed., Goethes Morgendlandfabrten, (Frankfurt: Insel 1999). 7. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, West~Ostlicher Divan, ed. Hendrik Birus. 2 vol (Frankfurt: Deutscher Klassiker Verlag, 1994), 1:549. This is the latest and most scholarly edition of the Dican, Equally useful is Goethe, Hes¢-Ostlicher Divan. Studienausgabe, ed. Michael Knaupp. (Stuttgart: Reclam, 1999.) 8. See relevant articles in Bernd Witte et al., eds., Goethe-Handbuch, , vol. 1: Gedichte, ed. Regine Otto and Bernd Witte (Stuttgart: Metzler, 1996). 49. Abu’l Qasim Mansi Firdausi (934~1025); Maulana Galalud-din Rami (1207-1273); Saih Aba—Abd~‘illah Mugarrif (u'd-din) b. Muslih Sadi (1213/19—1292); Hwage Samsu’d-din Muhammad Hafiz (1325-1390). ro. Hans Ruppert, ed., Goethes Bibliathek: Katalog (Weimar: Arion, 1958). 11. Marco Polo, L’Historia delle cose de Tartari, escr. da Marco Polo, in Navigatione et Viaggi race. da Giovanni Battista Ramusio, vol. 2 (Venice, 1674) and Reise it den Orient swibrend der Jabre 1272 bis 1295, trans. and ed. Felix Peregrin (Leipzig, 802); Johann de Montevilla [John Mandeville], Dess Johannis de Montovilla Curiense Reiss-Beschreibung, wie derselbe ins gelabte Land Palistinam, Jerusalem, Egypten, Tuerckey, Judacam, Indien, Chinam, Persien gekommen (n.p., 1692); Pietro della Valle, Reiss-Beschreibung in unterschiedliche Theite der Welt (Geneva, 1674); Adam Olearius [Oclschlaeger], Vermebrte Newe Bescheibung Der Muscowitischen und Persischen Reyse (Schleswig, 1661) and Culligierte .. . Reisebeschreibung (Hamburg, 1696); Jean-Bapti voyages en Turquie, en Perse, e¢ aux Indes (Utvecht, 1712); Jean Chevalier de Chardin, Vayage en Perse et autres lieux ide orient (Amsterdam, 1735); Fernio Mendes Pinto, Peregrinacam de Fernam Mendez Pinto (Lisbon, 1614); trans. anon. as Winderliche und merkwitrdige Reisen des Fernao Mendez Pinto (Amsterdam, 1671); Olfert Dapper, Asia ader Ausfithrliche Beschreibung des Reichs des Grossen Mogols und eines grossen Theis von Indien (Nuremberg: J. Hoffmann, 1681); and Frangois Bernier, Boénemens particuliers, ou ce gui s'est passée de plus considérable apres la guerre pendent 5 ans, ow environ, dans les Etats du Grand Mogol avec une lettre de U'étendue de l'Hindoustan (Paris, 1672), trans. W. Serlin as Auffgezeichnete Beobachtungen, was sich im Reiche des Grossen Mogols begeben (Frankfurt, 1673). 12, Carsten Niebuhr, Besebreibung von Arabien. Aus eigenen Beobachtungen und im Lande selbst gesammelten Nachrichten abgefasst (Copenhagen, 1772); Pierre Sonnerat, Reise nach Ostindien und China, auf Befehl des Kénigs unternommen vom Jabre 1774 bis 1781. Aus dem Franzésischen von Johann Pez2l. vols. (Zurich, 1783). Goethe owned thé Supplément au voyage de M, Sonnerat dans les Indes orientales eta 1a Chine (Paris, 1785). The letter is in WA, TV, 2:27. 13. Constantin Frangois de Chasseboeuf Volney, Reise nach Syrien und Agypten in den Jabren 1783, 1784, 1785 (Jena: J. M. Mauke, 1899); Louis-Antoine de Bougainvil Voyage autour du monde, par la Fregate du roi La Boudeuse et la Flute L'E toile 1767, 1768, 1769 (Paris, 1771), trans. Georg Forster as Reise um die Welt (1772); John rnier, Les sixGoethe’s Fantasies about the Orient 779 Hawkesworth, An account of the voyages undertaken by the order of his present majesty for making discoveries in the southern hemisphere. Drawn up from the journals which were kept by several commanders and from the papers of Joseph Banks, 7 vols. (London: Straham & Cadell, 1773~88), vol. 1-3 trans. Johann Friedrich Schiller and vol. 4~5 trans, Georg Forster as Geschichte der Seereisen und Entdeckungen im Sitd-Meer (Berlin: Haude & Spener, 1774-80); Johann Heinrich Merck, trans., Geschichte der See-Reisen nach dem Siidmeere, welche von Commiadore Byron, Captain Carteret, Captain Wallis und Captain Cook im Delphin, der Swallow, und dem Endeavour nach einander ausgefubrt worden sind (Frankfurt-Leipzig, 1775); Georg Forster, Reise um die Welt, wabrend den Jabren 1772 bis 1775 (Berlin: Spener, 1779~80) 14, Friedrich Alexander Bran, ed., Ethnographisches Archiv (Jena: A. Schmidt, 1808); Adam Christian Gapari and Friedrich Justin Bertuch, eds., Al/gemeine geograpische Emphemeriden (Weimar, 1797); Christoph Wieland, ed., Der teutsche Merkur (1773-99) and Der neue teutsche Merkur (:800-10); Christoph Meiners, Untersuchungen itber die Verschiednheit der Menschennaturen in Asien und den Siidlindern, in den Ostindischen und Siidseeinseln, nebst einer historischen Vergleichung. 3 vols. (Titbingen: Cotta, 181:~15); Friedrich Ludwig Walther (1759-1824), Von Menschenfiessenden Volkiern und Menschenopfern (Hof: Grau, 1785). 15. Moritz von Kotzebue, Reise nach Persien (Weimar, 1818); John Davy, Reise im Innern der Insel Ceylon (Jena: Bran, 1821). 16. See Goethes Werke, WA, LV, 3:189. 17. Sir William Jones was Chief Justice of Bengal, Sanskrit scholar, translator, founder of the Bengal Asiatic Society (the first learned society of Oriental studies) and its journal, Asiatic Researches. Goethe borrowed from the Anna-Amalia Library in Weimar his Paeseos Asiaticae Commentariorum Libri Sex, cum Appendice, ed. Gottfried Eichhorn (Leipzig, 1777); Antoine Silvestre de Sacy, Memires d'histoire et de literature orientales, 2-vols. (Paris, 1818); Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, Morgenlindisches Kleeblatt, bestebend aus persischen Hymnen, arabischen Elegien, titrkischen Eklogen (Vienna: Doll, 1819); Heinrich Friedrich von Diez, Dendwirdigkeiten von Asien in Kiinsten und Wissenschaften, Sitten, Gebriuchen und Alterthiimern, Religion und Regierungsverfassung aus Handschriften und eigenen Exfabrungen gesammelt (Berlin: Nicolai, 811); and Carminum orientalium Triga. Arabicum Mohammedis ebn Seid-ennas Iaamaritae. Persicum Nistmi Kendschewi. Turicum Emi. .., ed.J.G. 1 Kosegarten (Stralsund, 1815). 18, Heinrich Friedrich von Diez, Denkwitrdigkeiten von Asien [Noteworthy Asian curiosities] 2 vols. (Berlin: Nicolai r81r, 1815); see also Katharina Mommsen, Goethe und Diez. Quellenuntersuchungen z1 Gedichten der Divan-Epoche (Berlin: Akademie Verlag 1961); Othmar Frank, Das Licht von Orient (Nuremberg: Stein, 1808). 19. “Briefwechsel zwischen Goethe und v. Diez. Mitgeteilt von Carl Siegfried?” Goethe-Jabrbuch X1, ed. Ludwig Geiger (Frankfurt: Rittten & Loening, 1890), 24~413 20. Von Diez, Denkwiirdigkeiten von Asien, t4. These epistemological considerations are an important aspect of von Diez’s letters to Goethe. a1. Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Peregrine, 1985). See also Said’s Reflections on Orientalism (East Lansing: Michigan State Univ., 1983) and Culture and Imperialism (New York: Knopf, 1994).180 Eighteenth-Century Life 22. Georg Stauth, Islam und westlicher Rationalismus: Der Beitrag des Orientalismus zur Entstebung der Soxiologie (Frankfurt: Campus, 1993), 9- 23. Muhammad Iqbal, Bosschaft des Ostens. Als Antwort auf Geothes West-Ostlichen Divan, trans. Annemarie Schimmel (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1963). 24. Frankfiurter Allgemeine Zeitung 160 (13 July 2000): 3. 2s, Alain Corbin, “Gebannt im Ubergang” [“Transfixed in Transition’). Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 253 (30 Oct. 1999): 1-2: “The French Revolution bequeathed to the following century a new political and social time that liberated historiography from the general scheme of providence: it became the starting point for the thinking about historical becoming and the horizon of history.” §Copyright © 2003 EBSCO Publishing