Johann Wolfgang von Goethe spent almost two years traveling through Italy. In 1816 he published his "Italian Journey," laying the foundations for Germany’s enduring love of all things Italian.
Goethe in the Roman Campagna, by Johann Heinrich Wilhelm TischbeinImage: picture-alliance/akg-images
Advertisement
In one of his tales, German Romantic author E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776 -1822) described the Roman Carnival in vivid detail, despite the fact he'd never set foot in the Eternal City.
His contemporary Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832) didn't need to make anything up. He did indeed see it with his own eyes, and wrote that "the Roman Carnival is not really a festival given for the people but one the people give themselves… unlike the religious festivals in Rome, the Carnival does not dazzle the eye: there are no fireworks, no illuminations, no brilliant processions. All that happens is that, at a given signal, everyone has leave to be as mad and foolish as he likes, and almost everything, except fisticuffs and stabbing, is permissible."
Following Goethe's traces in Italy
From 1786 to 1788 Goethe fulfilled a lifelong dream by traveling through Italy. His notes published later as his "Italian Journey" became a bestseller. To this day tourists follow his journey through Italy.
Image: picture-alliance/D. Kalker
Brenner Pass
The Alps mark the beginning - this applies to any northern European wanting to get to Italy. Four major routes lead across the massive mountain range. Goethe chose the Brenner Pass. He headed towards his desired country by stage coach via Munich and Innsbruck. It took him two days. Today it only takes two hours to travel from Munich to the Brenner Pass - so long as there are no traffic delays.
Image: picture-alliance/blickwinkel/S. Derder
Lake Garda
Just behind the Alps you enter an entirely new world. Lake Garda for many northern Europeans is the epitome of the south. Deep blue water surrounded by mountains, a mild climate, picturesque villages, abundant vegetation and good food. Germans are particularly fond of Lake Garda. Goethe along with being fascinated had an unexpected adventure here as he was mistakenly arrested as a spy.
Image: picture-alliance/chromorange/W. Thoma
Malcesine
In Goethe's time villages along the lake could only be reached by boat or by clambering over adventurous paths - including Malcesine. Today it is the tourist center of Lake Garda. Here you encounter Goethe every step of the way - a memorial and a museum serve as reminders of the poet's visit. A marble plaque also adorns the Hotel San Marco, where Goethe stayed.
Goethe travelled in order to learn. His visit of the arena in Verona marked his first encounter with an ancient monument. Goethe was impressed by how well preserved it was - and still is. The arena in Verona seats 22,000 people. During the summer months a famous opera festival is held here.
Goethe spent two weeks in Venice. As a child he played with a toy gondola which his father brought back from his travels. Now Goethe himself gets to discover the lagoon city by gondola and seems never to tire of it. Today Venice is a city that appears to nearly be smothered by the love of visitors. In high season there are some 130,000 tourists to 55,000 residents.
On November 1st, 1786 Goethe arrived in Rome and wrote: "I have eventually reached the capital of the world." He spent four months here during which time he moved in with an artist, partied a lot, wrote a lot, experienced some erotic adventures and managed to satisfy his yearning for ancient monuments. The fascination of eternal city still attracts millions of annual visitors to Rome.
In Naples Goethe attacked the prevalent perception at the time in Germany, that Italians are idle. And the people of Naples loved him for it. He enthused about the colors of the city, the food and the smells. These days sadly those smells can be overwhelming - as the city often stinks to high heaven due to an ongoing refuse collection problem.
Image: picture-alliance/Photoshot
Mount Vesuvius
Locals call it the "hunchback". Mount Vesuvius on the Bay of Naples is one of the best known and most active volcanoes in the world. Its eruption in 79 AD buried the city of Pompeii in ash and lava. Goethe felt magically drawn to this volcano. He climbed up it several times. Today tourists are driven by bus to the crater.
The list of places Goethe visited on Sicily is long. He was particularly taken with the diversity of the vegetation. These days it's a known fact that Italy's biggest Mediterranean island is home to more than 3,000 plant species. Goethe was also bowled over time and again by the overwhelming views. Monte Pellegrino for him became the "most world's beautiful foothill."
Image: picture-alliance/Udo Bernhart
Taormina
Goethe is regarded as one of the first tourists to visit Taormina on Sicily's eastern coast, which today is the most popular tourist destination on Sicily. Goethe went to the ancient Teatro Greco with its view of Mount Vesuvius, where he was impressed by the combination of architecture and nature's backdrop. These days visitors can enjoy concerts and opera performances here.
Image: picture-alliance/ZB/W. Thieme
La Dolce Vita
Goethe was surprised by the one thing he wasn't prepared for - the Italian attitude towards life, their laid-back approach, optimism, and sensuality. "La dolce vita", the good life, was his great discovery in Italy. He put it into words and Italians adored him for doing so. In Germany those words in his travel journal inspired many with the desire to visit Italy - a desire that remains unabated.
Image: picture-alliance/robertharding/A. Cavalli
11 images1 | 11
The land where lemons grow
In the two years that Goethe spent journeying through Italy, a whole new world opened up to him. But 30 years passed before he published his account of the trip. The first volume of "Italian Journey" appeared in October 1816, exactly 200 years ago. Goethe was already 37 when he set off from the spa town of Carlsbad to Italy, following the footsteps of many intrepid German and British travelers and embarking on a Grand Tour. "Italian Journey" begins with the line: "As early as three o'clock in the morning, I stole out of Carlsbad; for otherwise I should not have been allowed to depart quietly."
Italian manor house, by GoetheImage: picture-alliance/akg-images
It was 1786, and Goethe was suffering from something of a mid-life crisis. He had grown tired of his duties in the court of Carl August in Weimar, and was frustrated by the limitations of his relationship with Charlotte von Stein, a married woman. He traveled incognito, calling himself Johann Philipp Möller, and made his way south via the Brenner Pass, Venice and Tuscany. Once he had arrived in Rome he stayed with his friend, the artist Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, and also took drawing classes with him.
From celebrated poet to drop-out
In 1787 Tischbein painted "Goethe in the Roman Campagna," inspired by the many short trips they took together. It shows Goethe against a backdrop of ancient ruins and rolling hills - the classic German image of Italy. Goethe is depicted in a semi-recumbent position, which looks more comfortable than it probably was. He looks far more at ease in another work by Tischbein, on display in the Casa di Goethe museum in Rome, housed in the building where they once lived. It shows Goethe lying on a sofa with his feet over its arm.These days, Italian visitors come to the Casa di Goethe in the Via del Corso to find out more about "Goethe as a homo universalis, the versatile writer who penned Faust," as museum director Maria Gazzetti explains. "Germans are more interested in Goethe as the originator of the German obsession with Italy, the Goethe who took time out, as it were, to broaden his horizons."
The building Goethe lived in with Tischbein is now the Casa di Goethe museumImage: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Classen
Rome as the capital of the world
Goethe didn't spend all his time in Rome admiring antique sculptures and comparing them to the Greek originals. He also enjoyed erotic adventures. One drawing shows him straightening pillows on his bed, under the beady eye of the goddess Juno. According to German literature expert Mauro Ponzi from the Sapienza University, Goethe "rediscovered the ancient world, countryside and Eros as a force of nature during his sojourn in Rome." He celebrated this new-found sensuality in his "Roman Elegies," which refer to a certain "Faustina," the daughter of a local innkeeper.
Straightening pillows for Faustina? A drawing by TischbeinImage: picture-alliance/akg-images
Goethe spent most of his time in Italy in Rome but also went further south, to Naples. He was drawn to Sicily, too - the former Greek colony which to him represented the closest approximation of the classical ideal. "Without Sicily, Italy creates no image in the soul: here is the key to everything."
A spiritual home
Goethe's two years in Italy were happy ones. Perhaps even the happiest in his life, says Goethe expert Marino Freschi - "thanks to the landscapes, his liberation from his office and his relationship with Charlotte von Stein, the arts and culture, the creativity, the sea - and thanks to Faustina." Today, "Italian Journey" continues to inspire legions of Germans to head south - like him, in search of sensual pleasure and freedom, untrammeled by duty and convention. Goethe's dream is still alive and well.
Goethe living it up in a Roman OsteriaImage: picture-alliance/akg-images
