Mathias Mayer. Eigentlichst, Nachbarlichst, Der Deinige: Goethes Absolute Freiheit Des Superlativs. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter. 106 Pp.

Summary

Like the fascinating essay on Goethe's use of personal pronouns in Albrecht Schöne's Der Briefschreiber Goethe (reviewed Goethe Yearbook, vol. 23), this study is an account of another formal feature of Goethe's written language. Before reading this small book, I would not have thought I was especially mindful of Goethe's abundant use of the grammatical feature known as the superlative; however, as the final chapter of this book makes clear, masters of German literature such as Thomas Mann and Thomas Bernhard have expertly and ironically channeled Goethe in this respect. However, the author, Mathias Mayer, a professor of German at the University of Augsburg, goes to great pains to banish the implication that, in Goethe's hands, the superlative is merely a rhetorical or stylish flourish, a mere “Schrulle.”

The first chapter introduces what is at stake here (“Die absolute und die absoluteste Freiheit”), discussing a passage from Phenomenology of the Spirit in which Hegel had set a limit to “the Absolute,” a terminus beyond which there is nothing but death and, hence, incomparable: “einen nicht mehr steigerungsfähigen Tiefpunkt.” Mayer goes on to demonstrate, with impressive documentation, that in Goethe's view, no such limits could be imposed on the processes of nature. To set the tone for what follows, the first chapter closes with a list of 192 instances of Goethe's passion for intensive expression in combination with the connecting particle “aller” (from “allbegabtest” to “allerzufälligst”).

The book's title showcases three of the many examples of Goethe's exceptional superlativizing—his “absoluter Gebrauch der Steigerung”—including a wealth of “elativer Wendungen,” a reference to a Latin model, which does not denote a comparison, but rather the intensification (i.e., pulcherrimus) of a descriptive quality. Thus, Goethe superlativizes even superlatives, creating a stand-alone term (i.e., without comparative function), resulting in an “absolute superlative.” It is from this “immerhin auffälligen und eigenwilligen Befund der Goetheschen Sprache” that we can reconstruct his world view.

Before getting down to the heart of the matter, two chapters survey experts on the superlative form (Gottsched, Harald Weinrich) as well as its enemies (because of its delusions of grandiosity: Nietzsche, Viktor Klemperer, Elias Canetti).