Tennyson and Goethe's Faust

by Tom Baynes

Overview

Tennyson’s interest in Goethe’s masterpiece began around 1824. It reached a remarkable level of intensity in 1833–34, and continued, intermittently, until 1855. The powerful influence that Faust exerted on his writings was mediated, most notably, by the translations of Abraham Hayward (1801–84), and it was often combined with that of a number of closely related works, by authors including Schiller, Byron, Shelley and Carlyle. This book reveals for the first time that Goethe’s masterpiece is a presence in at least two dozen of Tennyson’s poems, including several that are part of the canon of British literature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474488532
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	05/22/2023
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x (d)

About the Author

Tom Baynes studied English and History at the universities of London and Bristol. In 2011 he was awarded an AHRC doctoral studentship, and in 2017 he won the RES Essay Prize. His articles on Goethe, Schiller, Richard Graves, Byron, Keats, Carlyle, Bulwer Lytton, Dickens, Arthur Hallam and Tennyson have appeared in Essays in Criticism, The Review of English Studies, Notes and Queries, Romanticism, The Tennyson Research Bulletin and Publications of the English Goethe Society.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements Abbreviations Preface

Introduction: Faust and British Literature, c. 1810–92

I: The Death of Arthur Hallam

1 ‘I am to die already!’: the Gretchen Tragedy

2 ‘To strive onwards’: ‘Ulysses’, Progress and Trances

3 ‘Out of Orcus into Life’: Hallam and Part Two

II: Religion, Nature and Morality

4 ‘Two souls, alas, dwell in my breast’: Religious Doubt

5 ‘Unveil thyself!’: Faust and the Natural World

6 ‘The kiss of heavenly love’: Saints and Sinners

‘Last words’

Conclusion

Bibliography Index

Editorial Reviews

An outstanding work of literary-historical scholarship

John T. Hamilton

Brilliantly researched and cogently argued. A rare and valuable achievement, both supremely scholarly and eminently readable.

Valerie Purton