Tennyson and Goethe’s Faust

Tennyson’s interest in Goethe’s masterpiece began around 1824. It reached a remarkable level of intensity in 1833-34, and continued, intermittently, until 1855. The powerful influence that Faust exerted on his writings was mediated, most notably, by the translations of Abraham Hayward (1801-84), and it was often combined with that of a number of closely related works, by authors including Schiller, Byron, Shelley and Carlyle. This book reveals for the first time that Goethe’s masterpiece is a presence in at least two dozen of Tennyson’s poems, including several that are part of the canon of British literature.