...Oh boy. This is the first book I've ever read from Von Goethe and my introduction to German Romanticism.
The premise is simple. Our protagonist Werther falls in love with Lotte, an engaged young woman. We follow his decadence over the course of little less than two years, until he decides to put an end to his misery through suicide. It's an epistolary novel, conformed by multiple letters of the supposed Werther to his friend Wilhelm until the story of his death gets filled in by an "Editor".
Despite being thoroughly spoiled at the moment of reading this it was still amusing. To begin with, I loved the use of language in this book. I didn't read an original German text, but it was still beautiful and intricate. Werther has this deep appreciation, a love, for nature. He has this deep way of thinking about things and a melancholy. He finds the limitations of the human condition saddening. His descent into a deep depression and ending up unable to find any joy around him is heartbreaking. He's a person who struggles to connect with others and who finds the superficiality and hustle of aristocratic society disgusting and depriving. So when he meets Lotte, a girl who lost her mother and acts in the role of mother for her seven siblings. They connect seamlessly just in their first day upon meeting each other, and Werther falls in love with her. Even though he knew she's engaged, it's like he doesn't think about it on purpose. Or as he himself says "not in relation to her". Why??
Instead of moving on or keeping a distance, he indulges in his passion and begins visiting her daily. His feelings only fester, and he locks himself into a dangerous obsession that consumes him. Apparently he doesn't work at all, so he moves away from the town in an attempt to earn his family money and also move away from Lotte. We can infer that Wilhelm had become quite concerned for Werther's infatuation for Lotte with what we read on the letters, part of his insistence. But Werther only gets repulsion over the society he encounters on that trip, and he goes back to Walheilm and back to Lotte, but worn out and sickly. At his point she and Albert are already married. Werther only keeps sulking in his own nasty thoughts until he decides his fate. If you have ever gone throgh the experience of unrequited love, this will hurt. I loved the way it was portrayed in this book, the desire to give all of you up for someone.