Selected Poems

One of world literature’s towering figures, Goethe dominated two centuries of European writing and thought. The Enlightenment’s most wayward genius, and Romanticism’s most remarkable, he led two great artistic movements without fully subscribing to either. While his stature in the English-speaking world is often acknowledged, his poems are little regarded, for the simple reason that they have proven untranslatable. But thanks to John Whaley’s outstanding translation, Goethe’s poetry can at last be appreciated in English, with all its grace, music, and humanity intact.