Tag Archives: Sorrows of Young Werther

Soliloquies Changed Us Fundamentally

By Robin Bates | Published: December 10, 2023

Hamlet’s soliloquies changed the way we see ourselves and others and led the way to the novel.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Angus Fletcher, Charlotte Bronte, Hamlet, Harold Bloom, Harper Lee, Huckleberry Finn, humanism, Jane Eyre, Le Cid, Pierre Corneille, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Robinson Crusoe, Shakespeare, soliloquies, To Kill a Mockingbird, transcendentalism, Wonderworks | Comments closed

Does Lit Lead to Illicit Sex?

By Robin Bates | Published: August 25, 2020

Dante’s beautifully tragic account of Paolo and Francesca captures–as many great works do–the dangers of total absorption in a relationship.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Adultery, Charlotte Bronte, Christopher Marlowe, Dante, Doctor Faustus, Goethe, Inferno, Jane Eyre, Paolo and Francesca, passionate love, Romeo and Juliet, Samuel Johnson, Stephenie Meyer, Twilight, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

The Dangers of Emotional Identification

By Robin Bates | Published: February 4, 2020

In which I push back against an article warning about emotional identification with literary characters.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Age of Sensibility, Anne Radcliffe, Goethe, Hannah Arendt, Homer, Iliad, Jane Austen, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Namwali Serpell, Northanger Abbey, Sense and Sensibility | Comments closed

When Werther-Fever Upended Europe

By Robin Bates | Published: May 9, 2012

Goethe’s “Sorrows of Young Werther” created a sensation in 1774, with a young cult following and older attackers.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged adolescence, censorship, Goethe | Comments closed