Delphi Collected Works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe \(Illustrated\) pdfdrive com

THE END

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WILHELM MEISTER’S APPRENTICESHIP

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Translated by Thomas Carlyle

Goethe’s  second  novel  was  published  in  1795  and  concerns  the  eponymous

Wilhelm’s attempts to escape living the empty life of a bourgeois businessman,

embarking on a journey of self-realisation. The novel had a significant impact on

European  literature.  Wilhelm  Meister’s  Apprenticeship  represents  one  of  the

important  moments  in  the  eighteenth-century  and  it  is  one  of  the  first  works  to

popularise the plays of Shakespeare in Germany. In the narrative, Wilhelm and

his theatre group give a production of Hamlet, in which Wilhelm plays the lead

role.  Shakespeare’s  works  had  attained  tremendous  popularity  and  influence  in

Germany by the end of the century.

Goethe  began  working  on  the  novel  in  the  1770s,  but  it  was  not  completed

until  the  mid-1790s.  Goethe’s  close  friend  and  collaborator  Friedrich  Schiller

had a large hand in the novel’s final form. The novel is now considered as being

the  archetype  Bildungsroman;  a  literary  genre  of  novel  that  focuses  on  the

psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood.

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The first edition

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