Monatshefte

I. The Mephistophelian Imagination

The first thematic category, the "Mephistophelian imagination," is elucidated primarily in Faust I and II. Mephisto, the para-human devil, functions initially as a master illusionist. With attractive images he seduces Faust's fantasy, first in the scholar's study to a world of sensually appealing dreams, then to an eye-catching model of female beauty in the magic mirror of the witch's kitchen, and finally to irresistible desire for the "schöne[.] Bild" (verse 3248) and the person of Gretchen. Faust also calls her a "Götterbild" (v. 2716), when he has the upper hand emotionally and intellectually over his erotic impulses. Gretchen's own world of fantasies plays no insignificant role in the drama either. She fears losing her balance when she discovers Mephisto's little casket of jewels in the "Schrein" of her room. Poor as she is, her imagination conjures up the splendor of an aristocratic lady who, wearing such jewelry, would outshine her own simple natural beauty.

But the "Schrein" and treasure chest also point to the inner nobility of Gretchen's character and the strength of her love for Faust dwelling in her heart.¹⁰ This becomes apparent in the song Gretchen sings about the goblet of the King of Thule and the loyalty of love embodied therein, which foreshadows Gretchen's future loyalty to Faust. The metaphor of the heart as an enclosed chest, a chamber containing the image of the beloved is old. In a touching medieval German song, the lover claims to have lost the key to his faithful heart, telling his darling that she must remain in it forever.¹¹ Gretchen is not so lucky. The fact that she is so easily seduced by the jewels in the box and by Faust who knows loyalty only to his striving is indicated by the key which is directly attached to the treasure casket. Because of the key's immediate availability, it takes no effort or skill to access the treasure. Goethe through this constellation emphasizes the fact that on a basic level the human imagination functions as a handmaid of desire. Biologically and erotically propelled, psychologically [End Page 3] rooted in semi-or sub-consciousness, often socially conditioned, the imagination on this level intertwines itself with sensuality. It operates with little or no freedom. It can easily fall victim to its own seductive power, to appealing well-meant suggestions, or to malicious manipulations of others.

In the second part of Faust, Goethe endows key and treasure chest as symbols of the imagination with additional and enhanced functions.¹² Both objects also appear as seemingly separate entities, especially when their metamorphosis and far-flung interconnections increase in complexity. A few examples will suffice to illustrate specific features typical for the functions of the Mephistophelian Imagination in Faust II. In the first act's festival "Mummenschanz" parade at the emperor's court, Faust embodies the Poet and stands for God Plutus, the allegorical personification of immense material and immaterial riches. But his large overflowing treasure chest serves the youthful emperor's imagination only as a quick means to acquire money, which he believes can remedy the chaotic conditions of his empire. His impetuous grasp for the gold envelops him in a ball of fire. The ensuing imaginary conflagration symbolizes his and the crowd's insatiable greed. It illustrates Mephisto's success with illusions and simulacra, leads to the invention of paper money, and foreshadows the outbreak of civil war in Act IV.

Goethe employs the symbol of fire, Mephisto's favorite element, to demonstrate the potential interrelationship of entertainment, deceit, lust, and violence and their connection to the powerful force of the human imagination. In the Masquerade, before the fire breaks out, Mephisto as Clown uses the treasure chest's malleable gold as material to form a key-shaped erotic image, a phallus. Its shock and entertainment value has lost none of its draw, and Mephisto's tricks have found multiple replications in old and modern media.

The connection between the dark and dangerous side of the imagination and the capacity of entertainment to incite deceit and violence also figures prominently in Goethe's allegorical festival play Des Epimenides Erwachen, written after the Napoleonic wars. There the figure of the entertaining Clown pronounces himself "der gefährlichste von allen" "Dämonen der List." Since "everyone considers him trivial" he can easily "deceive the entire world." After transforming into his second shape—that of a "böser Geist"—, the Clown disappears and Mephisto's trademark, the flame of fire bursts from the ground.¹³ In regard to the aberrations of the human imagination producing certain forms of entertainment, which Goethe characterizes as "Tummelplatz häßlicher Kreaturen," he in 1805 makes the observation,

[ . . . ] wie nötig es sei, in der Erziehung die Einbildungskraft nicht zu beseitigen, sondern zu regeln, ihr durch zeitig vorgeführte edle Bilder Lust am Schönen, Bedürfnis des Vortrefflichen zu geben. Was hilft es, die Sinnlichkeit zu zähmen, den Verstand zu bilden, der Vernunft ihre Herrschaft zu sichern: die Einbildungskraft lauert als der mächtigste Feind, sie hat von Natur einen unwiderstehlichen Trieb zum Absurden, der selbst in gebildeten Menschen mächtig wirkt und gegen [End Page 4] alle Kultur die angestammte Roheit fratzenliebender Wilden mitten in der anständigsten Welt wieder zum Vorschein bringt.¹⁴

The Mephistophelian imagination, however, acts not only as seducer and deceiver, but also as facilitator, an agent that can challenge and strengthen knowledge and creativity. We can call this the "Instrumental Imagination," which, depending on its use, has beneficial or damaging results. The paradoxical self-definition of Mephisto found in Faust I, as "Ein Teil von jener Kraft, / Die stets das Böse will und stets das Gute schafft" (v. 1335f.), also applies to the artistic realm. Goethe makes use of this theodicy concept—explicitly stated in the "Prolog im Himmel"—when he causes the devil to serve Faust's higher purposes. It is Mephisto who, for example, provides Faust with the required magical key that leads him to the realm of the Mothers, interpreted by Dorothea Lohmeyer as a Goethean personification of the archetypes of life. Among these, Faust will find the model of supreme female beauty in occidental literature and art, Helena of Greece. Since Mephisto's fantasy is not creative, he himself has no access to the archetypes, but he can provide the wherewithal and the key which grows in Faust's hand and keeps him from getting lost in the timeless and spaceless depths of nature and of his unconscious.¹⁵

II. The Therapeutic Imagination

The significance of our second category, the "therapeutic imagination," which inspired many Goethean works and to which he saw himself particularly committed, cannot be over-emphasized. The two Wilhelm Meister novels, written, like Faust I and II, over a time span of some 60 years, highlight this human and artistic faculty. It is embodied in the creative and self-reflective central character, Wilhelm who, when recognized as such behind the intentionally belittling mask of an unassuming "average chap," becomes a hero of undeniable importance and consequence. The functions of the therapeutic imagination reveal themselves as major themes in both novels. Goethe regarded healing and teaching, liberating and inwardly ennobling the reader through art as his supreme mission. In his paradigmatic Bildungsroman and artist novel, Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre, the pitfalls, the detours, and the necessary contributing factors for healing and educating the artistic imagination are symbolically depicted.¹⁶ Learning to master it further in the second titular novel, his Wanderjahre, Wilhelm becomes a thinker, a poet, and a physician. With his songs, interpersonal mediation and curative know-how he helps individuals, families, and social groups. He is able to save his own son, Felix, on two levels: de facto from death by drowning in the river and metaphorically from emotional despair.

Key and treasure chest assume unlocking gateway functions also for the therapeutic imagination. While Wilhelm in his youth, after looking long and [End Page 5] assiduously, finds the key to the pantry in which the chest with his beloved marionettes is hidden, Felix (in the sequel) discovers a little treasure casket in a mountain cave, deep inside a "large iron box." Pointing to its gold and enamel adornment, the author compares this closed and locked "Kästchen" from the depths to a magnificent little book, reminding us of the David and Goliath story booklet Wilhelm secretly stole from the case containing the marionettes. But Wilhelm is conceived as the budding poet who masters his craft and eventually merits his last name, Meister—Master. In contrast, Felix, although he starts out full of promise cannot open the book-like treasure chest, not even at the end of the novel when the right key is found and tried. Youthfully impulsive, he breaks it in the lock. He also fails in the pursuit of Hersilie, his love interest.

For Goethe the therapeutic function of the imagination becomes particularly significant in healing the wounds of the heart, brought about through the loss of one's love, or by fantasies enmeshed in a "selbstgeschaffnen Wahn" causing excessive hope or fear.¹⁷ Several of Goethe's early dramas and his novel Die Leiden des jungen Werther deal thematically with the capability of making fruitful use of the gift of one's therapeutic imagination, or the failure, either tragically or humorously treated, of doing so. In Goethe's early drama Lila of 1776/77, Dr. Verazio, i.e. Dr. "Truth", declares: "Wenn wir Phan tasie durch Phantasie kurieren könnten, so hätten wir ein Meisterstück gemacht."¹⁸ The successful cure seems to confirm a principle of a "homöopathische Seelenheilkunde," however, with the still rather naïve psychological insight: "Was Lieb und Phantasie entrissen, / Gibt Lieb und Phantasie zurück."¹⁹ The heroine is healed by performances mixing reality and fantasy, caringly "staged" by her relatives. They mirror her past experiences in such a way that her frightful phantasms can turn into healing images ultimately leading her to recognition of the truth in her situation.

These programmatically formulated statements are transformed, immensely enhanced and variously differentiated in Wilhelm Meister's life story by Goethe's multilayered networks of symbolic constellations. In merging the memory of the marionettes with the traumatic and haunting image of his lost love, Mariane, Wilhelm therapeutically creates in the treasure chest of his heart and on the externalized stage of his imagination the figure of the wondrous Mignon. He makes her into his adopted child who sings his songs of longing and loneliness. Narratively, she functions up to a point as a very beneficial twin or doppelganger figure in the novel who, however, also carries the potential for a tragic outcome. Poetologically, her ultimate transformation into a work of art by Wilhelm's therapeutic imagination and by the support of certain members of the Tower Society, has to take place in the "Saal der Vergangenheit" (VII, 574) of Natalie's castle. On a higher level, Mignon's obsequies and marble casket at the end of the novel represent a parallel to Wilhelm's "Reliquienkästchen" (VII, 80), described in Book II, which preserved love notes as well as small memorial objects of Mariane. Memory of the past [End Page 6] is a human, and especially an artist's treasure reservoir. Without it the imagination would not function. Even the future is unthinkable and unimaginable without the experiences and knowledge accumulated in the past.

A humorous analogy, where no healing occurs as it does for Wilhelm Meister, makes even more explicit use of the symbols of key and treasure chest in illustrating the relationship of nature, art, and the artistic imagination. In Goethe's early literary satire, Der Triumph der Empfindsamkeit, King Andrason's helpful alter ego, Sora, unlocks with a "Hauptschlüssel"²⁰ the room in which the foolish Prince Oronaro keeps in boxes an artificial nature for his imagination, since authentic nature is too powerful for his maudlin heart. That he is indeed a fool indicates his name "Oronaro," an anonym for "O, o, o Narr." One of his boxes also carries a life-size female puppet. Sentimental books like Rousseau's Nouvelle Héloise and Goethe's own Werther fill her straw-stuffed bosom. Oronaro loves not a live woman, but an artificial image assembled from popular works of sentimental literature and represented in a puppet with the "stolen" likeness of King Andrason's wife. As one can see, Goethe satirizes here in the figure of a fool a solipsistic and psychologically unhealthy lifestyle. The fantasy of the foolish prince dwells in false, theatrical manipulations. He satisfies the longing of his heart with artificial substitutes. The figure of Oronaro illustrates not only the preference of shadow images over what is real but also the masking and perversion of reality.²¹ In contrast to this truly sick prince, healthy King Andrason represents a "Phantasie für die Wahrheit des Realen" in this play, possessing an educated and cultivated imagination which, according to the author, is the mark of the true artist.²²

In Goethe's last fictional prose work, Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre, the hero initially carries a secret object like a fetish with him, "das halb wie eine Brieftasche, halb wie ein Besteck aussah" (VIII, 40). Beautifully adorned wallets in other sections of the novel contain poems and love notes.²³ Wilhelm's possession reveals itself as a doctor's small instrument case, which will assume its greatest significance after he has finished his studies and begins to heal others. The scalpel or surgical knife found inside the instrument case resembles a key. This surprising reconfiguration of key and case for Wilhelm Meister symbolizes the fact that what usually opens an enclosure now has become an integral part of its content: a key is no longer necessary to open the doctor's case. Instead both, key and case, function in concert in Wilhelm's hands to heal others. The analytical faculties, so to speak, have become part and parcel of the treasure chest, and the imagination has become "umsichtig" and "geregelt."²⁴

The motif of the "Kästchen" in its function as a healer's treasure chest is introduced to the Wilhelm Meister novels in the very center of Lehrjahre (Book 4, Chapter 6: in the 49^th of a total of 98 chapters, excluding Book Six which is not divided into chapters). Its structural and thematic significance is heightened by the fact that Natalie also makes her first appearance in the [End Page 7] center of the book as a figure of light and as a worldly "Heilige." Under the "heilsame[n] Blick ihrer Augen" (VII, 228) a surgeon takes care of Wilhelm who has been wounded during a robbery attack. Wilhelm recognizes the surgeon "an dem Kästchen, das er in der Hand hatte, und an der ledernen Tasche mit Instrumenten" (VII, 227).²⁵ In Wanderjahre, he attributes his career choice and his purchase of the required instruments to his cure by Natalie's "helpful" presence and the hand of the "tüchtige Wundarzt" (VIII, 280). Additionally, in the 1829 version of the novel the terrifying experience of a boyhood trauma is told by Wilhelm. Having witnessed the drowning of a newly found friend leaves an indelible impression. It qualifies even more than what the Wundarzt narrator of the Neue Melusine and her "Kästchen-Schloß" relates as something which makes the maturing artist and poet "noch immer in der Erinnerung unruhig" (VIII, 354).

All of these events become the springboard for Wilhelm's healing career on the "Real-" as well as the "Bedeutungsebene."²⁶ At the end of the novel, Wilhelm Meister has, indeed, mastered his fate and his craft, as the omen of his last name predicted. His therapeutic successes in the healing arts are based on experience and knowledge as well as on an educated imagination that is rooted in the unconscious as well as the conscious creativity of the mind. Goethe says it directly and best in the very last letter he wrote:

Je früher der Mensch gewahr wird, daß es ein Handwerk, daß es eine Kunst gibt, die ihm zur geregelten Steigerung seiner natürlichen Anlagen verhelfen, desto glücklicher ist er; was er auch von außen empfange, schadet seiner eingebornen Individualität nichts. [ . . . ] Hier treten nun die mannigfaltigen Bezüge ein zwischen dem Bewußten und Unbewußten; [ . . . ] Bewußtsein und Bewußtlosigkeit werden sich verhalten wie Zettel und Einschlag, ein Gleichnis, das ich so gerne brauche.²⁷

III. The Playfully Creative Imagination

Mainly associated with lyrical poetry, the third category of Goethe's "Phantasie," for which the metaphor as "Schoßkind" of Jupiter in the above-mentioned poem "Meine Göttin" seems most appropriate, can be called the "playfully creative imagination." Goethe's childlike "Geniusgestalten" in general, display much of this light-footed or winged form of "Einbildungskraft," but also its demonic potentials. In his first Wilhelm Meister novel and his second Faust drama, the poet personifies it in the androgynous or androgynously dressed figures Mignon, Knabe Lenker and Euphorion.²⁸ But the playfully unencumbered creative imagination also reigns supreme in that prose genre which Novalis considers the "Canon der Poesie," namely the fairy or fantasy tale.²⁹ Goethe likewise states: "Ohne Poesie läßt sich nichts in der Welt wirken: Poesie aber ist Märchen."³⁰ While all three of his Kunstmärchen captivate the reader with their perplexing paradoxes and magic allure, they reveal the traits of Goethe's maturity as a poet and thinking artist. The structural integrity of [End Page 8] these fairytales leaves no doubt that the author's seemingly unbridled creative imagination works hand in hand with a supreme form of consciousness, which he calls "Besonnenheit." In "Noten und Abhandlungen" of West-östlicher Divan Goethe writes:

Die Besonnenheit des Dichters bezieht sich eigentlich auf die Form, den Stoff gibt ihm die Welt nur allzu freigebig, der Gehalt entspringt freiwillig aus der Fülle seines Innern; bewußtlos begegnen beide einander, und zuletzt weiß man nicht, wem eigentlich der Reichtum angehöre. / Aber die Form, ob sie schon vorzüglich im Genie liegt, will erkannt, will bedacht sein, und hier wird Besonnenheit gefordert, dass Form, Stoff und Gehalt sich zueinander schicken, sich ineinander fügen, sich einander durchdringen.³¹

To no surprise, the motifs of key and treasure chest occur in his tree art tales in various manifestations, most explicitly in Die neue Melusine, a playfully puzzling and amusingly ironic component of Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre, yet, as Melusine claims and not just for the "Abenteuer": "Die Sache ist ernsthafter, als du denkst" (VIII, 363). A few years earlier, Goethe had composed what he paradigmatically entitles Das Märchen, and he included Der Neue Paris in his autobiography, Dichtung und Wahrheit. Since the latter two fantasy tales not only incorporate a number of treasure chests and keys but also transform them in progressively complex metamorphoses, I shall focus on their interpretation in greater detail than was possible in the previous comparative overview.

Goethe's three fantasy tales basically deal with different phases of initiation into the all-important relationship of life and art and the imagination's vital role in the process. Two of them also incorporate the significant symbol of the bridge as being absent, temporary or permanent. The different metamorphoses and constellations of the bridge in regard to amazing new juxta-positions of key and treasure chest symbolize most aptly the maturing artist's developmental stages in relation to art and life.

In Goethe's "Knabenmärchen" Der neue Paris—one of several retrospective, ironic, and symbolic "wiederholte Spiegelungen" of himself—the pubescent youthful story teller bears a number of similarities to the experiences, feelings, fantasies, and thoughts of the ten-year old Wilhelm Meister. The novel's hero, specifically called Goethe's beloved "Ebenbild,"³² discovers to his great joy the enticing and thought-provoking marionettes in "nebeneinanderstehende Kasten," when by chance the pantry key is left sticking in the usually locked door. In the author's words, these figures represent nothing less than Wilhelm's "Helden-und Freudenwelt" (emphasis added), the puppet-sized embodiments of "Freunde und Feinde." Wilhelm memorizes the story of David and Goliath not only in the attic, where Mignon later sleeps, but also, among other places, in "allen Winkeln [ . . . ] des Gartens" (VII, 19–21).

The magical garden, in which the semi-fictional story teller, a somewhat "narcissistic" young poet and "Neue Paris," not of Troy but of Frankfurt, finds [End Page 9] himself, resembles a poetic treasure chest of large dreamlike proportions. Inside the magnificent garden walls, a river and two golden fences bordering the river's edges separate the circular outer from the inner realm and form barriers to the as yet secret center of the garden. Only after he has fulfilled certain conditions, is the boy granted permission to cross the river. A magic temporary bridge comes into existence when the fences, composed of vertically arranged spears shaped like upwardly pointing keys, collapse against each other and allow him passage. Arriving in the garden's central pavilion, the boy discovers three beautiful majestic women, who resemble in color the three apples the winged messenger-god, Mercury, had given him in a dream the night before. Not yet capable of understanding either their significance or the "heavenly music" they perform, the youthful poet is also not able to fulfill the mission entrusted to him by the gods. Instead, he plays games with a miniature nymph whose singing and dancing he is able to appreciate. She shows him her treasures, dolls, and puppets in glass cases. The toy soldiers of both genders, which the children carry in "Kasten" (IX, 60) onto the golden bridge, magically stand up without support and form two opposing armies. As the author specifically notes, they follow the pattern of the opposing spears of the bridge, turning the formerly friendly companion into a "Gegnerin" in the ensuing confrontation. In the context of its use of mythological figures and in analogy to specific other Goethean works, the choices which the juvenile "Narziß" makes in this fairytale point to more than what appears to be a typical battle of pre-teen children. Not only biological and psychological gender conflicts are portrayed, but also the vital issues of the young poet's artistic development, as can be seen in the following events (IX, 60–62).

In the attempt not to be defeated by his new friend, the boy pretending to be "Achilles," throws his agate balls too ferociously at the girl's cavalry so that her "Amazon" centaurs break apart. Miraculously they reassemble, become "alive" and move by themselves, analogous to Wilhelm Meister's puppets, the marionettes from the boxes in the pantry, when they entered his imagination.³³ The boy's angry and hurtful confrontation with his playmate results not only in the loss of her and the toy figures but, more significantly for this fairy tale, in a retraction of the temporary bridge. The key-shaped spears rise up, throw the unrestrained young poet off the formerly supportive playground and form a barrier again. Although the key-shaped spears now prevent him from reaching the inner sanctuary—Wilhelm Meister calls a puppet player's secret enclosure a "Heiligtum" (VII, 19)—there is at least hope of entering the magical poetic garden again through the changing constellations of three objects outside the gate and by keeping Mercury's mission in his mind.

After being ushered out of the garden, the impetuous budding poet discerns on the wall opposite the gate nut trees, an inscription, and a fountain basin arranged perpendicularly above each other like a giant key. He makes sure to remember this configuration as a point of reference for possible future entries into the magic garden. Puzzling enough, and cause for much scholarly [End Page 10] speculation, is the fact that Goethe includes a drawing of a vertically positioned key with the larger-sized handle or head at the top as an illustration in Wanderjahre.³⁴ In Der neue Paris the narrator, after describing how these three objects "senkrecht über einander [standen]," adds: "ich wollte es malen, wie ich es gesehn habe." (IX, 64, emphasis added).

When the young story teller in this—for the autobiography of a poet—even more relevant fantasy tale, later revisits the area and attempts to repeat his adventure, he finds to his great surprise that all three objects have not only altered their appearance slightly, but are spread far apart. The garden gate is altogether gone. Upon further visits, however, the three objects seem to approach each other. This consoles him and provides him with the hope, even the assurance that if in the future the conditions are right, he will "mein möglichstes tun, das Abenteuer wieder anzuknüpfen" (ibid.). In contrast to Felix, who in Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre breaks the key to the book-like treasure casket and finds healing and solace only through his knowledgeable father, Goethe in his autobiographical retrospective confirms the artistic potential and well-founded hopes of his younger self. After all, had he not described himself in the fairy tale as "Ein Liebling der Götter" and later in life, with increasing maturity, fulfilled their charge to deserve this appellation? (IX, 63).

By the additional analogy of function and action, the key to Felix's "Prachtbüchlein" provides proof that the configuration of the objects found on or above the wall opposite the secret garden gate indeed constitutes a key. Its parts separate at the end of the "Knabenmärchen"; they can come together again under certain circumstances and for the right person. The wise elderly autobiographer knows the specifics and puts them as a prediction into the mouth of his youthful "Ebenbild": "Wahrscheinlich, wenn alles wieder zusammentrifft, wird auch die Pforte von neuem sichtbar sein" (IX, 64, emphasis added). As we are informed in the second to last chapter of Wanderjahre, the likewise "broken" and separated parts of Felix' key originally were "magnetisch verbunden." In the hands of the right person, here an elderly "werter Goldschmied," the broken parts again "halten einander fest, aber schließen nur dem Eingeweihten" (VIII, 485, emphasis added). It is he who fulfills the prerequisites of craftsmanship and knowledge and thus as a true "initiate" can open the treasure chest. The theme of an attempted, a failed, a partly or completely successful "initiation" connects, among other works, Goethe's three fairy tales with Wilhelm Meisters Lehr-and Wanderjahre.

In Das Märchen, Goethe symbolically delineates the phases and cooperative actions necessary for the successful development, interaction, and cooperation of the best of human qualities on a personal and social level.³⁵ Not coincidentally, this classical fairy tale was composed in 1795 during the revision and completion of Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre (1794–96). Both works raise the task of how to master life and the creative imagination to an entirely new level when compared with the "Knabenmärchen." On the surface, fairy tales [End Page 11] seem totally "ein Produkt der Einbildungs kraft [die von] ihren eigenen Flügeln getragen und geführt [wird]," playful, light, easygoing and certainly without any obvious didactic purpose (VI, 209). On the other hand, Goethe concedes in Dichtung und Wahrheit that the inventors of such stories find themselves rewarded when they "der Einbildungskraft Stoff zu neuen Bildern und dem Verstand zu fernerm Nachdenken [ . . . ] hinterlassen" (IX, 447). The fictional narrator of Das Märchen even uses one of the paradoxical caveats which are so typical for Goethe's pronouncements about his own works, namely that through this fantasy tale the listeners "an nichts und an alles erinnert werden sollen" (VI, 209).³⁶

At the outset of Das Märchen, several serious and potentially fatal conflicts exist which have to be resolved with wisdom and circumspection. This time, a permanent, rather than a merely temporary bridge must be built over the river which divides a land in disarray and paralysis. This is one of the most important conditions to be fulfilled before the powerless Prince—young Goethe and Wilhelm Meister are also called "Prinz"—can marry Lilie without being killed by her touch. No longer relatively harmless like the dancing nymph in Goethe's boyhood tale, "die schöne Lilie" reigns in her garden of art on the other side of the river but, as long as the spell of her unmediated beauty, the "tödliche Zauber des schönen Scheins," is not lifted, she paralyzes or even destroys life.³⁷

Lilie, "die vollkommene Schönheit," embodies the essence of her garden.

That this garden, just as its likeness in Goethe's "Knabenmärchen," symbolically represents a place of poetry, art and a realm of ideals, both dangerous and beneficial, seems obvious. The author specifies his symbolization with three additional features. Beautiful Lilie can infuse precious stones and art objects with only "ein halbes Leben." This is the "life" which the imagination and the "schöne Schein" of art display. She knows and points out what art cannot do: "Alle Pflanzen in meinem großen Garten tragen weder Blüten noch Früchte." Living creatures with the ability of organically reproducing themselves and their own kind do not exist in this garden, whereas works of art thrive, when planted by her hand "in einen sonst unfruchtbaren Boden" (VI, 222–227). And it is Lilie who sings, plays the harp, composes a poem, and is adorned with a light-emanating veil, Goethe's symbol for "der Dichtung Schleier,"³⁸ so that Katharina Mommsen calls her a "Dichterin."³⁹ The relationship of three and one, found in Goethes "Knabenmärchen" is reversed. The one supreme beauty, Lilie, has replaced the former dancing nymph. Alerte's "Gebieterinnen," who had played their instruments in vain for young "Narziß," have now been transformed into three female companions of Lilie, serving her and reflecting aspects of her beauty in the garden of art. At the end of Das Märchen, Princess Lilie, a descendent from Jupiter's beloved "lap child," becomes what was predicted, namely the loyal, no longer perilous, "unverwelkliche Gattin" of a matured, knowledgeable and empowered Prince. [End Page 12]

Instead of boxes containing marionettes, puppets or toy soldiers which captivated the imagination of the young Wilhelm and the Neue Paris, a chest-like enclosure, a temple with the statues of kings, figures prominently in this fantasy tale. As yet hidden underground in the depths of the mountains like Felix's "Prachtbüchlein," but only much larger and much more difficult to retrieve, it represents an equally indispensable treasure for the Prince as does Lilie's garden. Whereas the action in Der neue Paris proceeds largely on a horizontal level, the vertical dimensions play a major role in the symbolic topography of Wanderjahre and Das Märchen, becoming most obvious in the Snake's progressively upright and supportive position and in the upward movement of the formerly buried treasure. This temple with the living statues of three distinctly differentiated kings made of gold, silver, and bronze respectively, has to be brought into the light of day so that their brother, the fourth king, will no longer rule as he does in times of psychological and political darkness. In epistemological and poetological perspectives, the three kings represent the conscious cognition and focused application of developed and clearly differentiated human faculties.⁴⁰ In contrast, their brother, composed of arbitrarily mixed metals, illustrates the clumsiness and excessive proneness to error or outright chaos, which undifferentiated thoughts and actions of an unlettered human nature or a dangerous political adventurism produce. He collapses into an ugly heap when the Prince, endowed with the gifts of the three genuine kings and married to his bride who has been delivered from her predicament, overcomes his former paralysis and rules his kingdom with wisdom and benevolence.

Before that happens, however, the inevitable question arises how the underground temple can be entered and by what means this particular treasure vault will be unlocked. Felix, as we have seen, failed in his attempt; the Neue Paris accomplished something, Wilhelm Meister succeeded. With fairy tale humor, Goethe resorts to the gold-eating will o' the wisps for help. Resembling keys with their vertical flames, they also act as keys. With their pointed tongues they lick and consume the golden lock and bolt to open the underground temple's gate. Goethe strengthens the image of their cooperation and key-like function even more when he points out that "sie die Spitzen ihrer Flammen zusammenneigten und [ . . . ] mit ihren spitzesten Flammen Schloß und Riegel aufzehrten" (VI, 234, emphasis added).

As a form of ambiguous temporary enlightenment, another will o' the wisp had lit the path to the Walpurgis Night festivities for Faust and Mepisto. Similarly, but on the higher level of serious initiation, the personification of analytical problem-solving and factual enlightenment, Jarno in Lehrjahre, leads Wilhelm Meister to the door of the secularized chapel, the innermost sanctuary in Lothario's castle. Here the hero is initiated into the formerly secret Society of the Tower mainly for two purposes: to complete himself by integration with what the other members symbolically represent, and to enrich [End Page 13] them by complementing their talents and faculties with his own productive imagination.⁴¹ Just as the formerly obscure "emissaries" of the Tower Society and their actions eventually become an "open enigma" for the supposedly merely "lucky" protagonist of Goethe's Bildungsroman of the Artist, the hidden treasure chest of the fairy tale temple rises from the depths of the earth to the sun-lit surface on the other side of the river in the terrain of Lilie's garden. All prerequisites fulfilled, it reveals its content to the initiated. Curious or greedy visitors, however, are satisfied with appearances or gain: just as the revelers do in the "Mummenschanz" scene of Faust II, they grab for gold coins which the departing will o' wisps scatter around with fun and ease to please the crowd.

The magnificent permanent bridge erecting itself to connect the two previously divided shores and to lead up to the emerging temple, is what Bernd Witte calls a "Kunstwerk und Kommunikationsmittel zugleich."⁴² It is built by the gold-eating and evolving Green Snake who initiates the whole process of healing, recovery, and transformation. The epistemological and poetological significance of the bridge is linked to the function of the will o' the wisps as key, the recognition of the temple as treasure chest and endowment, and the helpful cooperation of the "Kräfte"⁴³ which constitute this fantasy tale. Symbolically they together provide the reliable foundations and strong connections on which the mature artist depends. This is corroborated by statements Goethe makes when he talks about the production of "wahre," "durchgedachte," "ganze" and "Meister-Kunst."⁴⁴

In contrast to the self-assured Narcissus of Goethe's "Knabenmärchen," the humble Green Snake embarks on an amazing road of discovery and development. His natural curiosity and sense perceptions had already endowed him with the ability to form a temporary bridge at specified times across the river. This, according to Goethe, corresponds to an artist's experiences and possession of a "sensual fantasy" which, even though it is lacking enlightened reasoning and higher insight, can temporarily link up with the realm of art. After eating the will o' the wisps' gold, the Snake attains greater knowledge and clearer vision which allow him to distinguish the underground temple's four kings through the light emanating from his body. Finally, under the guidance of the wise Old Man with the Lamp, the Snake with his natural curiosity and acquired cultivated capabilities not only preserves the paralyzed Prince from decay, but also revives him with Lilie's help. The Snake's "sacrifice" of his temporary existence in order to erect the permanent bridge parallels Goethe's belief in a "Stirb und werde."⁴⁵ For the healed Prince, beautiful Lilie and her touch have become benign, because her realm of art henceforth will be intimately connected to life and reality. Built out of the jewels and precious stones into which the Snake's body had transformed, the bridge's permanence, translucent structure and firm support arches constitute essential features for this fairy tale's happy ending. They symbolize the majesty of what Goethe in [End Page 14] an essay written a few years earlier had designated as the highest form of art, "Stil," which is founded on the "tiefsten Grundfesten der Erkenntnis, auf dem Wesen der Dinge, insofern uns erlaubt ist, es in sichtbaren und greiflichen Gestalten zu erkennen."⁴⁶

Effortlessness, lightness, and seeming willfulness characterize many inventions of Goethe's "playfully creative imagination." But as we have seen, "Be sonnenheit" and "umsichtige Einbildungskraft" play no less a role in the themes and structures of the fairy tales which are part of his mature oeuvre. Another favorite term of the author, occurring for the first time in Das Märchen and frequently used later on, is the logically paradoxical but symbolically resolvable phrase: "das offenbare Geheimnis."⁴⁷ Visualized, this concept is embodied foremost in the integrated functions of "treasure chest" and "key." The ingenious symbolic use of this and other polar configurations allows the poet, as master craftsman, to operate on several levels of insight and presentation simultaneously, so that a wide spectrum of readers can enjoy his works. But it also provides the means which Goethe as author loves to employ, namely, to play with the reader's own perspicacity, initially hiding what only patient observation, circumspect cogitation, and knowledge can detect. Thus, even though broad interest in Goethe's works continues undiminished, much remains to be discovered, especially in regard to the artistic structures of his vast symbolic networks. Playing the detective to unveil among other intriguing challenges the author's carefully concealed self-reflections, and to trace his consummate craftsmanship, is indeed exciting and rewarding.