Weber, Goethe, and William Penn
Themes of Marital Love
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3141850 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Stephen A Kent (University of Alberta, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1985 |
| Volume | 46 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 315 |
| Publication date | 1985-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Sociological Analysis (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0038-0210 • E-ISSN: 2325-7873 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/3710696 |
| OpenAlex | W2360006097 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 7 |
Havingargued in a previous study that Weber was deeplymoved by both Nietzsche's Obcrmen-schen concept and Goethe's embodiment of it, this research note demonstrates that Weber inter-pretedhisown asceticmarriage with Marriane in part through impressions that he held of William Penn's marital relationship and Goethe's presumablychaste relationship with Frau von Stein. De-spite, however, the extent to which Weber lauded the ethicaldimensions of marriage, his own life and writingscontrasted them with an appreciation of the eroticaspects of love. He came to cherish these aspects through an extended affair with, ironically, his wife's lifelong friend. In a recent examination of Max Weber's use of Quaker material in his 'Protestant ethic ' thesis, I argued that Weber's idealization of Puritans was historically inaccurate because he viewed them through a literary and philosophical conception of inner worldly Obermenschen (overmen or supermen) suggested in the works of Nietzsche and Goethe (Kent, 1983). The most interesting aspect of the argument dealt with Weber's use of Goethe in crucial essays on various sociological topics, an important example of which occurred at the end of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Kent, 1983: 302-305, 308-309). Behind these uses of Goethe in his academic writing was the deep impression that Goethe had made on the Weber private man-the youthful Weber had secretly read Goethe's Works while sitting at his school desk (Marianne Weber, 1926: 47-48); and the adult Weber relaxed with his wife by returning to Faust for enjoyment (Marianne Weber, 1926: 454).1 Given the profound impact that Goethe had on Weber, I was not surprised to learn that Goethe apparently provided a model through which the famous sociologist inter-preted his emotionally complex marriage with Marianne. Much of what we know about the marriage's complexity, including its apparent unconsummation (Mirzrnan, 1970
Art · Art history · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Classics · Psychology · Religion and Society Interactions · Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,12 |
| Citation span | 1993 - 2023 (31) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |