Prometheus (Goethe)

Prometheus is a poem by Johann Wolfgang Goethe, in which the character of the mythic Prometheus addresses God (as Zeus) in misotheist accusation and defiance.

In early editions of the "Collected Works" it appeared in Volume II of Goethe's poems in a section of "Vermischte Gedichte" (assorted poems), shortly following the "Gesang der Geister über den Wassern", and the "Harzreise im Winter". It is immediately followed by the "Ganymed", and the two poems together should be understood as a pair. Both belong to the period 1770-1775. "Prometheus" (1774) was planned as a drama but not completed, but this poem draws upon it. Prometheus is the creative and rebellious spirit which, rejected by God, angrily defies him and asserts itself; Ganymede is the boyish self which is adored and seduced by God. One is the lone defiant, the other the yielding accolyte. As the humanist poet, Goethe presents both identities as aspects or forms of the human condition.

Although the 'setting' is classical, the address to the Judaeo-Christian God is suggested by the section beginning 'Da ich ein Kind war...' ("When I was a child"): the use of 'Da' is distinctive, and by it Goethe evokes the Lutheran translation of Saint Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians, 13.11: 'Da ich ein Kind war, da redete ich wie ein Kind...' ("When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things"). Unlike St Paul, Goethe's Prometheus grew up to disbelieve in the divine heart moved to pity for the afflicted.

The poem was set to music by Schubert and by Hugo Wolf.

Source

*J.W. Goethe, "Goethe's Werke: Vollstandige Ausgabe letzter Hand" (Vol II, 76-78). (J.G. Cotta'schen Buchhandlung, Stuttgart und Tubingen 1827).
*J.W. Goethe, "Gedichte" (Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin u. Tübingen 1988)
*Dr Martin Luther, "Die Bibel, oder die ganze Heilige Schrift des Alten und Neuen Testaments".