| In this study I analyze the occasional works that Goethe created during his early years at the Weimar court for Duchess Louise's birthdays. The time span covered is demarcated by Goethe's arrival at the Weimar court in 1775 and his departure to Italy in 1786. Duchess Louise, the wife of Goethe's employer and patron, Duke Carl August, was the principal recipient of Goethe's theatrical offerings during this time. The works created for Louise are particularly interesting for the considerable experimentation they display: idiosyncratic interaction of drama and music in two early plays, and juxtaposition of allegories, symbols, and "types" in the masquerades. I shall relate these plays and masquerades to Goethe's life, his literary work, the sociological context of the court, patronage and the artist, his evolving views on the social function and aesthetic status of occasional works, and the interrelation of literature, music, dance, and his views on art and nature making up what Goethe called "das schone Ganze," or "the beautiful totality.".;I use the term of occasional work as an umbrella term for the literary works Goethe created for the Weimar courtiers and tied to a particular function. According to a widely held contemporary view, Gelegenheitsdichtung or occasional poetry was a second-rate literary genre that stood in the shadow of autonomous "real" works of art. Goethe, however, considered the concept of Gelegenheitsdichtung to be rooted in life and possess fundamental conviviality and purpose, its "occasionality" worth cultivating for the way it bound a work to a particular time and function. (Abstract shortened by UMI.). |
