The Word

Thanks to my lack of computer (read: limited internet time), I've been able to finish Goethe's Faust. I liked it a lot, and while I can't speak to the original, I felt that Walter Kaufmann did a fine job rendering the poetry into English. The lines have both rhythm and beauty without being full of archaisms. (Reading this made me think I should try Shakespeare, now that he isn't required).

Faust is an intellectual, a man who values action. And he is driven. In the prologue, the Devil (Mephistopheles) bets God that he can ensnare Faust's soul. The Lord replies that "A good man in his darkling aspiration / Remembers the right road throughout his quest." And while undoubtedly sometimes Faust recognizes his errors, he never really changes his course of action. To the end, he maintains his ambitions. [Skip this paragraph if you don't want a spoiler] So while I knew how the play ended, I was still very surprised that he was saved. The angels say, "Who ever strives with all his power, / We are allowed to save." Deus ex machina. But is it really because of Faust as a person, or because Mephisto can't be allowed to win? Please do comment if you can clarify the ending or point me towards some secondary sources.

[End spoiler]

There is a motif throughout Faust which I think will make for a nice segue into Mann's Doktor Faustus. Faust, as a man of action, often casts aspersions on 'the word.' At one point he opens a book and reads "In the beginning was the Word." He changes it in his 'translation' to "In the beginning was the Act." Faust is not really one to value art or aesthetics in and of themselves. Goethe sets up several exchanges to this effect. An excerpt:

Faust:
If you have anything to say,
why juggle words for a display?
Your glittering rhet'ric, subtly disciplined,
Which for mankind thin paper garlands weaves,
Is unwholesome as the foggy wind
That blows in autumn through the wilted leaves.

Wagner:
Oh God, art is forever,
And our life is brief.

In T.J. Reed's Thomas Mann: The Uses of Tradition, I read that Goethe, with Schiller, was a pioneer in aesthetics (drawing on Kant's influence). To paraphrase Reed (and this is from memory, sorry), they argued that art should be valued as an aesthetic creation, and not for its ability to deceive. Hardly a novel concept now, but at that time it was a challenge to the notion that art and literature had to be transparent 'windows' onto the world, that they were only worthwhile for their ability to depict life.

And interestingly, it is Faust himself who cannot see art's value. Wagner doesn't have a huge role, but Mephistopheles takes over, echoing the 'art is forever' dictum. He also says something that I found very surprising and very modern:

I lost much time on this accursed affliction,
Because a perfect contradiction
Intrigues not only fools but also sages.
[....]
Men usually believe, if only they hear words,
That there must also be some sort of meaning.

Faust never comes around, but as another spirit says, "The human being is, his life long, blind." Mann's Faust is himself an artist (a musician), so I am interested to see where he goes with this.

[And once again, I apologize for the lack of coherence. I'm just a bit stressed out.]