Johann Wolfgang von Goethe | Autograph letter signed, to H.C.A. Eichstädt, 14 November 1804

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Autograph letter signed ("Goethe"), to [Heinrich Carl Abraham Eichstädt], ABOUT WILHELM VON HUMBOLDT

referring to a reply which he encloses [not included here] concerning G.A.F. Ast [specifically the latter's comments on a review of his Sophocles translation by Heinrich Voss], suggesting that they try to prevent the rift between two young people active in the same field [Ast and Voss] from becoming irreconcilable, further informing him that Humboldt [i.e. Wilhelm von Humboldt] has allowed them to make use of passages from his letters so long as his name is not mentioned, and also stating that he will inform him of the arrival of the bishop of Oldenburg as soon as he learns of it

Mit unserm lieben Professor Voß bin ich einig geworden beyliegendes als eine Antwort auf die Astische Erklärung vorzuschlagen. Finden Ew. Wohlgeb. etwas dabey zu erinnern; so wünschen wir es zu vernehmen[.] Lassen Sie uns ja womöglich zu verhindern, daß der Riß zwischen zwey verdienten jungen Leuten, die in einem Felde sich bemühen, nicht unheilbar werde.

H. v. Humbold[t] hat mir nur unter Bedingung der Verschweigung seines Namens die Erlaubniß gegeben von Stellen seiner Briefe Gebrauch zu machen...

2 pages, 4to (c.22.5 x 19.2cm), integral blank, paginated in another hand ("213" and "214"), with a typed transcription, Weimar, 14 November 1804, pinholes to blank leaf

The Humboldt referred to here is Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835), the great German philosopher, linguist and diplomat, who at the time of Goethe's letter was plenipotentiary Prussian minister at Rome. The two other scholars referred to here in this academic missive to H.C.A. Eichstädt, editor of the Jenaische Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung, are the classicist and translator Johann Heinrich Voss (1751-1826) and the philosopher and philologist Georg Anton Friedrich Ast (1778-1841), whose translation of the tragedies of Sophocles had appeared earlier in 1804.

LITERATURE:

Goethe-WA-IV, Bd.17 (no. 4985)