FEBRUARY 20
God bless you, my dear ones, and give you all the good days of which He deprives me.
I thank you, Albert, for deceiving me: I waited for news of when your wedding day would be, and I had resolved to take down Lotte’s silhouette most solemnly from the wall on that day and bury it under other papers. Now you are married, and her picture is still here! Well, so it shall remain! And why not? I know I am with you both, and without injury to you, I am in Lotte’s heart, indeed I hold the second place there and want to and must keep it. Oh, I would go mad if she could forget—Albert, hell lies in that thought. Albert, farewell! Farewell, angel from Heaven! Farewell, Lotte!
MARCH 15
I have been so greatly vexed that I may be driven away from here. I’m gnashing my teeth! The devil take it! It cannot be made good, and it’s all your fault, you who spurred me on and drove me and tormented me to take a position that was not what I wanted. Now I’ve got mine! now you have yours! And so you won’t say again that it’s my high-minded ideas that ruin everything, here you have, my dear sir, the narrative, plain and unadorned, the way a chronicler would write it down.
Count von C. is fond of me, favors me—that is a known fact, that is something I’ve told you a hundred times. Yesterday I was invited to dinner at his home, the self-same day when in the evening the noble company of gentlemen and ladies, to whom I’ve never given a thought, meets at his house, nor did it ever occur to me that we underlings do not belong there. Very well. I eat with the Count, and after the meal we walk up and down in the great hall, I speak with him, with Colonel B., who joins us, and so the hour for the assemblage approaches. God knows that I suspect nothing. Thereupon there enters the excessively gracious Lady von S. with her husband and thoroughly hatched little goose of a daughter, with her flat chest and dainty laced bodice, and widen en passant their exaltedly noble eyes and flare their nostrils as tradition dictates, and as this class of people disgusts me to the core, I was about to take my leave, waiting only until the Count was rid of their obnoxious prattle, when my Fräulein B. arrived. As my heart always leaps up a little when I see her, I stayed put and took my stand behind her chair; it was only after a while that I realized she was speaking to me less freely than usual, with some embarrassment. I was struck by this. Is she, too, like all these people? I thought, and was stung and wanted to go, and yet I stayed because I would have been glad to forgive her and did not believe what was happening and still hoped for a kind word from her and—what have you. In the meantime the company was filling up. Baron F. in a wardrobe dating in its entirety from the coronation of Francis the First; Court Councilor R. but here, in view of his status, titled Herr von R. with his deaf wife, etc.; never forgetting the ill-dressed J., who patches the holes in his old-fashioned wardrobe with newfangled rags. They come up in twos and threes, and I speak with several persons of my acquaintance, who are all very curt. I thought—and attended only to my B. I did not register that the women at the end of the room were whispering into each other’s ears, that the whispers circulated among the men, that Frau von S. was speaking with the Count (all that was told me afterward by Fräulein B.), until finally the Count came up to me and drew me into a window niche.—You are familiar, he said, with our wonderful conditions; the company is displeased, I notice, to see you here. I would not want under any circumstances—Your Excellency, I interrupted, a thousand pardons; I should have thought of it sooner, and I know you will forgive me this lapse; I meant to leave a while ago. An evil genius held me back, I added, smiling, as I bowed.—The Count squeezed my hands with an emotion that said it all. I slipped quietly away from the distinguished company, went out, got into a cabriolet, and drove to M——, there to watch the sun set from the hill and read in my Homer the splendid scene where Ulysses enjoys the hospitality of the excellent swineherd. All that was well and good.
In the evening I return for supper; there were only a few people in the taproom, playing dice on one corner of the table: they had turned the cloth back. Then the honest A. comes in, puts down his hat, and catching sight of me, walks up and says quietly, Have you had a bad time?—I? I said—The Count ordered you out of the company.—The Devil take it! I said, I was glad to get out into the fresh air—It’s good, he says, that you’re taking it so lightly. The only thing that annoys me is that it’s already all over the place.—That’s when the thing really began to get under my skin. Everyone who came to the table and looked at me made me think: He’s looking at you because of that! It made my blood boil.
And today, everywhere I turn I am pitied, and I hear that those who are jealous of me are now triumphant, saying: There you see where the arrogant end up, those who think themselves superior on account of their scrap of intellect and believe that this entitles them to rise above the conventions, and more of the same low drivel—then you feel like thrusting a knife into your heart; because you can speak of independence as much as you like, but show me the man who can bear to have scoundrels talk about him when they have an advantage over him. When their blather is harmless, oh, then it’s easy to ignore them.
MARCH 16
Everything conspires against me. Today I met Fräulein B. on the avenue; I could not refrain from talking to her, and as soon as we were at some distance from the others, I revealed my pain at her recent behavior—Oh Werther, she said to me in a tender tone, how could you interpret my confusion this way, you who know my heart? How I suffered for you from the moment I came into the room! I foresaw the whole thing, a hundred times it was on the tip of my tongue to tell you. I knew that von S. and von T. and their husbands would sooner leave than remain in your company; I knew that the Count was in no position to spoil things between them—and now the commotion!—How is that, Fräulein? I said, concealing my dismay, because at that moment everything Adelin had said to me the day before was rushing through my veins like boiling water—What it has already cost me! said the sweet creature as tears came to her eyes—I could no longer control myself, I was about to throw myself at her feet.—Explain yourself! I cried.—Tears streamed down her cheeks. I was beside myself. She dried them, without attempting to conceal them.—You know my aunt, she began, she was present and saw it, oh, with what a look! Werther, I had to get through the night, and this morning I had to endure a sermon about associating with you and had to listen to her denigrate, demean you, and I could and might only half defend you.
Every word she spoke pierced my heart like a sword. She did not realize what a mercy it would have been to conceal all of it from me, and now she went on to add the gossip that would be spread and the sort of people who would now gloat. How they would be tickled and delighted at the retribution for my arrogance and my scathing opinion of others, for which they had long reproached me. To hear all that, Wilhelm, from her, in a tone of the most genuine sympathy—I was shattered and am still furious inside. I wanted someone to dare to reproach me, so that I could run him through with my rapier; the sight of blood would make me feel better. Oh, a hundred times I have seized a knife to relieve this constricted heart of mine. I have heard about a noble breed of horses which, when they are terribly overheated and agitated, instinctively bite open a vein in order to breathe freely. This is how I often feel, I’d like to open a vein that would grant me eternal freedom.
MARCH 24
I have asked the Court for my dismissal and will, I hope, receive it, and you will forgive me for not asking your permission first. I simply had to go away, and I already know everything that you would say to persuade me to stay, and so—Break it gently to my mother, I can’t help myself, and she will have to accept the fact that I cannot help her either. Of course, it will pain her. To see her son’s brilliant career, just at its beginning and leading to privy councilor and ambassador, come to a stop and now . . . back, little ox, into your stall! Make what you will of this and figure out the possible conditions under which I could have and should have stayed; enough, I’m leaving; and so that you may know where I’m heading, there is a Prince *** h
ere who finds my company to his liking; he heard of my decision to resign and has asked me to accompany him to his estates and enjoy the beauties of spring there. I am to be left entirely to my own devices, he promised, and as we do understand one another up to a point, I intend to take my chances and go with him.
April 19
FOR YOUR INFORMATION
Thanks for both your letters. I did not reply because I left this page blank until my departure from the Court was at hand; I was afraid that my mother might apply to the Minister and make it more difficult for me to carry out my plan. But now it is done, my release is here. I won’t tell you how reluctantly my leave was granted and what the Minister wrote me—you would burst into renewed lamentations. The Crown Prince sent me twenty-five ducats as a going-away present, along with a note that has moved me to tears; and so I will not need the money from my mother for which I recently asked her.
MAY 5
I’m leaving here tomorrow, and because my birthplace is only a detour of six miles from my route, I want to see it again, want to recall the old days I happily dreamed away there. I will enter by the very gate through which my mother drove out with me when, after my father’s death, she left that dear, familiar place to confine herself in her unbearable town. Adieu, Wilhelm, you will hear of my journey.
MAY 9
I have completed the nostalgic journey to my hometown with all the reverence of a pilgrim, and I was gripped by many unexpected emotions. I had the coach stop at the great linden tree that stands a quarter of an hour’s drive from the town on the road to S——, got out, and had the coachman drive on so that I could savor every memory on foot in a wholly new way, vividly, to my heart’s content. Now I found myself standing under the tree that, when I was a boy, had been the end point and the boundary of my walks. What a difference! At that time, in blissful ignorance, I longed to set out into the unknown world, where I hoped to find so much that would nourish my heart, so much pleasure to fill and gratify my striving, yearning breast. Now I have returned from the great world—oh, my friend, with how many shattered hopes, with how many ruined plans!—I saw rising before me the mountains that had been the object of my longing a thousand times over. I could sit here for hours, yearning to be on the other side, losing myself with all my heart and soul in the woods, the valleys that appeared to my eyes in so inviting a twilight; and when the hour approached that I had to return, with what reluctance I would leave that dear place!—I drew nearer to the town; I greeted all the old familiar garden houses, I heartily disliked the new ones, as I did all the other changes that had been made. I walked through the gate and found myself at once, wholly and completely. Dear friend, I do not wish to go into detail; as charming as it was for me, it would become just as tedious in the telling. I had intended to stop at the market square, right next to our old house. On the way I noticed that the schoolroom, where an honest old woman had cooped up our childhood, had been converted into a small store. I remembered the restlessness, the tears, the dullness of mind, the anxiety I had endured in that hole.—I took no step that was not remarkable. A pilgrim in the Holy Land does not encounter so many places laden with religious recollections, and his soul is hardly so full of holy emotion.—Just one example from a thousand. I walked downstream along the river toward a certain farm; that used to be one of my walks and one of the spots where we boys practiced producing the greatest number of skips as we sailed flat stones across the water. I remembered so vividly how I sometimes stood and watched the water, the wondrous intimations with which I followed it, how full of adventure I imagined the regions to which it flowed, and how quickly I reached the limits of my imagination; and yet the movement had to continue, had to go farther, always farther, until I was completely lost in contemplation of an invisible distance.—You see, my dear friend, just so limited and so happy were the splendid patriarchs! just so childlike were their feelings, their poetry! When Ulysses speaks of the immeasurable sea and the infinite earth, it is so true, human, intensely felt, confined, and mysterious. What use is it to me that now, along with every schoolboy, I can parrot that the Earth is round? Man needs only a few clods of earth to enjoy life, fewer to rest beneath it.
Now I am here, at the Prince’s hunting lodge. It is easy to get along quite well with the gentleman, he is sincere and uncomplicated. He is surrounded by some peculiar people, whom I cannot understand at all. They don’t seem to be rascals, and yet they do not have the look of honest men. Sometimes they seem honest to me, and yet I cannot trust them. What pains me further is that he often speaks of matters he has only heard or read about and always from the exact standpoint that some other person has presented to him.
He also values my mind and my talents more than he does this heart of mine, which is the sole object of my pride, the only source of everything, all my strength, all my bliss, and all my wretchedness. Oh, anyone can know what I know—my heart belongs to me.
MAY 25
I had something in mind that I didn’t want to tell you about until it was carried out: Now that nothing will come of it, I may as well tell you. I wanted to go off to war; my heart had been set on it for a long time. It was chiefly for this reason that I followed the Prince, who is a general in the service of ***. When we took a walk together, I disclosed my intention to him; he advised against it, and it would have had to be more of a passion than a whim of mine had I refused to listen to his reasons.
JUNE 11
Say what you want, I cannot stay here any longer. What am I supposed to do here? Time hangs heavy on my hands. The Prince treats me as well as anybody can, and yet I am not in my element. Basically we have nothing in common. He is a man of reason but of a quite ordinary sort of reason; his companionship is no more entertaining than a well-written book. I’ll stay another week and then set off into the blue again. The best thing I’ve done here is my drawing. The Prince has a feeling for art and would have an even deeper feeling if he were not limited by that vile academicism and its conventional terminology. Sometimes I gnash my teeth when, my imagination taking fire, I lead him through nature and art, and he suddenly thinks he’s done the correct thing by bumbling in with a stock technical term.
JUNE 16
Yes, truly, I am nothing more than a wanderer, a pilgrim on this earth! You, then—are you anything more?
JUNE 18
Where is it that I mean to go? Let me tell you in confidence. I must remain here for two more weeks after all, and then I’ve deluded myself into thinking that I want to visit the mines in ——, but really, there’s nothing to that, I just want to be nearer to Lotte, that’s all. And I laugh at my own heart—and do its bidding.
JULY 29
No, it is well! All is well!—I—her husband! Oh God, Who created me, if You had granted me this bliss, my whole life would be one continuous prayer. I have no wish to contend with You, and pardon me these tears, pardon me my vain desires!—She, my wife! If I had taken into my arms the dearest creature under the sun—a chill runs through my whole body, Wilhelm, when Albert grasps her around her slender waist.
And, do I dare say it? Why not, Wilhelm? She would have been happier with me than with him! Oh, he is not the man to fulfill all the desires of that heart. A certain lack of sensibility, a lack—make of it what you will; that his heart does not beat sympathetically at—Oh!—at the passage in a favorite book where my heart and Lotte’s beat as one; as on a hundred other occasions when it happens that we voice our feelings about the behavior of some third person. Dear Wilhelm!—Certainly, he loves her with all his soul, and what doesn’t that sort of love deserve?
—An unbearable fellow has interrupted me. My tears have dried. I am distracted. Adieu, dear friend.
AUGUST 4
I am not the only one to whom this happens. All men are disappointed in their hopes, deceived in their expectations. I visited that good woman under the linden trees. Her oldest boy ran up to meet me, his shouts of joy brought out his mother, who looked very dejected. Her first words were: Good sir, alas,
my Hans is dead!—He was the youngest boy. I was silent.—And my husband, she said, returned from Switzerland empty-handed, and if it were not for some good folk, he would have had to beg his way home, he caught a fever traveling.—There was nothing I could say, and I gave the little boy something; she asked me to accept a few apples, which I did, and I left this place of sad memories.
AUGUST 21
The ease with which we turn over a hand: that’s the way I change. Sometimes a joyous glimpse of life makes an effort to flicker into existence again, alas, for only a moment!—When I lose myself in dreams, I can’t resist the thought: What if Albert were to die? You would! Yes, she would—and then I pursue this fantasy until it leads me to the brink of abysses from which I recoil with a shudder.
When I walk out of the gate, along the road I took the first time to fetch Lotte for the dance, how utterly different things were! Everything, everything, has gone by! No hint of the world as it was, no pulse-beat of my earlier emotion. I feel as a ghost must feel who returns to the burned-out ruins of a castle he, as a prosperous prince, built and appointed with all the articles of splendor and, full of hope, bequeathed to his beloved son on his deathbed.
SEPTEMBER 3
Sometimes I cannot understand how someone else can love her, is allowed to love her, when I love her so exclusively, so intensely, so fully, and recognize nothing nor know nor have anything but her!
SEPTEMBER 4
Yes, it is so. As nature declines into autumn, it is becoming autumn in and around me. My leaves are turning yellow, and the leaves of the neighboring trees have already fallen. Didn’t I once write you about a peasant boy, just after I came here? Now I’ve inquired about him again in Wahlheim; I was told that he had been driven out of his job, and no one claimed to know anything more about him. Yesterday I met him by chance on the way to another village, I spoke to him, and he told me his story, which moved me doubly and triply, as you will easily understand when I recount it to you. But what is the point, why don’t I keep to myself something that frightens and sickens me? Why should I trouble you as well? Why do I always give you the opportunity to pity me and chide me? Let it be: this too might be an element of my fate!
The Sufferings of Young Werther: A New Translation Page 8