The Sorrows of Young Werther by R D Boylan

The Sorrows of Young Werther by R D Boylan

Complete and unabridged edition.

The Sorrows of Young Werther (German: Die Leiden des jungen Werthers) is a loosely autobiographical epistolary novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774. A revised edition followed in 1787. It was one of the most important novels in the Sturm und Drang period in German literature, and influenced the later Romantic movement. Goethe, aged 24 at the time, finished Werther in five-and-a-half weeks of intensive writing in January-March 1774. The book's publication instantly placed the author among the foremost international literary celebrities, and was among the best known of his works. Description from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was a German civil servant, philosopher, statesman, public reformist, and prolific man of letters. As acting director of the theater at Weimar, Goethe was an early participant in the Sturm und Drang movement--one that encouraged extremes of emotion in the arts. But it was Goethe's work as a writer that made him an ennobled celebrity by the time he was twenty-four. His wide-ranging career encompassed playwriting, epic and lyric poetry, prose and verse dramas, memoirs, novels, literary criticism, and notable scientific treatises. Goethe's tragedy Faust is considered his magnum opus.

R. D. Boylan's translation of The Sorrows of Young Werther was one of the first to bring international attention to the sensational cult novel. Boylan's grasp of the language and its idioms, his commitment to accuracy, and his admiration for Goethe's work resulted in a translation that is world renowned for capturing the unique spirit in which the book was written. Boylan's other translations of Goethe's work include The Elective Affinities, The Recreations of the German Emigrants, and The Good Women.