¹ Henry Crabb Robinson (1775-1867): English diarist, journalist, conversationalist, translator, and barrister-at-law. He was one of the founders of the Athenæum Club and of University College, London. His Diary, Reminiscences, and Correspondence, edited by Thomas Sadler, and first published in London in 1869, is his best known literary legacy and forms a most fascinating and valuable source of information for the student of contemporary English and German literature. There is an American edition published in Boston by Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877, to which references here are made. Cf. also the following articles by Jean-Marie Carré: Quelques lettres inédites de William Taylor, Coleridge et Carlyle à Henry Crabb Robinson sur la littérature allemande, Revue Germanique (1912), pp. 34-49; Un ami et un défenseur de Goethe en Angleterre; H. C. Robinson, pp. 385-415 of the same volume; ‘The Characteristics of Goethe’ de Sarah Austin et la collaboration de H. C. Robinson, Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen, cxxxi, pp. 145-152; and, in the same volume, William Whewell et H. C. Robinson, pp. 425-427.

² Goethe writes to Zelter, Aug. 20, 1829: “Zu gleicher Zeit war ein Engländer bey uns, der zu Anfang des Jahrhunderts in Jena studirt hatte und seit der Zeit der deutschen Literatur gefolgt war, auf eine Weise von der man sich gar keinen Begriff machen konnte. Er war so recht in merita causœ unsrer Zustände initiirt, dasz ich ihm, wenn ich auch gewollt hätte, und wie man wohl gegen Fremde zu thun pflegt, keinen blauen phraseologischen Dunst vor die Augen bringen durfte.”

³ The unfavorable attitude of Walter Bagehot toward the personal influence of “old Crabb” is easily understood; he knew Robinson as an old man only. At the well-known breakfasts which Robinson often gave for his friends, there seems to have been very little breakfast served, according to Bagehot, but much Goethe and Schiller. Cf. Bagehot, Henry Crabb Robinson, The Fortnightly Review, xii (1869), pp. 179 ff.

⁴ Cf. Diary, ii, p. 171.

⁵ Whether Robinson later received any recompense for his labor, I have been unable to determine; it seems improbable.

⁶ Mr. William A. Speck, the present owner and curator of the collection which bears his name, has kindly placed these letters at my disposal and rendered valuable assistance in the preparation of this article.

⁷ Fox was originally a Unitarian clergyman, his periodical was Unitarian in sympathy, and its readers were composed to a great extent of Unitarians. In 1832 the Monthly Repository, which had been both literary and theological from the beginning, had also assumed a political character.

⁸ Crabb Robinson was notoriously modest.

⁹ Words in italics are underscored in the original.

¹⁰ William Taylor of Norwich published in 1830 Historic Survey of German Poetry in three volumes. It was an important undertaking, historically, being the first of its kind in England, and it contained some good translations, but its intrinsic value, as a whole, was mediocre. Lack of sufficient knowledge, serious omissions, and poor critical judgment were the most common charges against the Survey. A disproportionately large amount of space is devoted to August von Kotzebue, whom Taylor believed to be greater than Goethe.

¹¹ That is, the June number, since this article is printed in the month following its composition. Sometimes, as in the account of Faust, there are two months between the date of writing and the time of printing. The “verses” in question were poems by Goethe, with translations, and were inserted in the July number. See next letter.

¹² See Monthly Repository for 1832, p. 302.

¹³ Concerning this translation we obtain some interesting information in the first sentence of Robinson's second article on Goethe's writings: “Our attempt to convey some idea of the nature of Goethe's poetry by an account of the contents of the first four volumes, is so unsatisfactory to ourselves, that we are desirous, before we proceed to another class of his writings, of presenting our readers with a few specimens of translation; and, for that purpose, with permission of the translator, we will reprint a few articles which appeared nearly thirty years ago, in a work of very confined circulation, and entirely forgotten now.” See Monthly Repository for 1832, p. 460.

There is no doubt that the translator mentioned here is none other than Robinson himself, and that the “work of very confined circulation” was the Monthly Register to which Robinson had contributed about thirty years before. He writes to his brother Thomas, in 1802: “One of my employments during a part of 1802-3 was that of contributor to a magazine entitled the Monthly Register, and edited by my friend [J. D.] Collier. The subjects on which I wrote were German literature, the philosophy of Kant, etc. I also gave many translations from Goethe, Schiller, and others, in order to exemplify the German theory of versification.” See Diary, i, p. 87.

¹⁴ They are so printed in the July number.

¹⁵ That is, printer's sheet, signature.

¹⁶ Poems, giving both text and translation.

¹⁷ Volumes 5 and 6 of Goethe's works (Vollständige Ausgabe letzter Hand, in 40 volumes, the publication of which was begun in 1827). The second and third papers, the first and second on Goethe's works, dealt with the first four volumes, comprising Goethe's lyric poetry.

¹⁸ The catalogue of the dramas began in the middle of the third article on Goethe's works; that is, in the fourth number of the whole series.

¹⁹ That is, to print a few poems, etc., from Goethe's works.

²⁰ Possibly to determine what character of poems to select.

²¹ In Robinson's Diary for April 2, 1832 (ii, p. 170), for instance, we note the following: “My nephew called and brought the news of Goethe's death.—I had lying by me three letters for Weimar and Jena and resolved not to alter them, but put them in the post today. They were addressed to Madame Goethe, Voigt, and Knebel.”

²² Major Karl Ludwig von Knebel (1744-1834), lyric poet and translator. He was undoubtedly Robinson's most intimate German friend.

²³ It has proved impossible to determine the exact date of this note. Granting, however, that the “article” in the last two letters is the same, it follows from the P. S. in the preceding letter that the date is probably later than June, 1832; for Robinson had already received the June copies of his series and probably did not ask for any more until another monthly instalment had appeared. If Robinson actually waited until the “article” was complete, the parcel could not have been sent until after April, 1833, when the series of papers on Goethe was finished. However, the date is not important.

²⁴ A note by Crabb Robinson on Wieland did see the light two years later in Characteristics of Goethe by Sarah Austin. See vol. ii, pp. 227 ff.

²⁵ Anna Letitia Barbauld, born Aikin (1743-1825). Robinson's diary contains numerous references to her.

²⁶ The condemned poem must have been Cupid, the Landscape Painter (Amor als Landschaftsmaler), the only poem of the seven submitted which was not printed.

²⁷ Amor als Landschaftsmaler is written in the unrhymed trochaic pentameter.

²⁸ Another proof that Robinson did his own translating.

²⁹ I learn that the trochaic pentameter was practically unknown in England in 1832.

³⁰ Could the last lines of Amor als Landschaftsmaler give offence, even to an English reader of 1832?

³¹ Such as Egmont and Iphigenia in Tauris.

³² Robinson was not blind to the shortcomings of William Taylor as a critic, but was ever ready to do him justice for his pioneer work in German literature. Robinson's feeling toward Taylor can best be understood from the initial sentence of Robinson's “defence” (Monthly Repository for 1832, p. 517): “The writer of these remarks would deem it a neglect of duty were he to omit so fair an opportunity of expressing his gratitude to Mr. William Taylor of Norwich, who first opened to him the treasures of German literature. It is now nearly forty years since Mr. Taylor's excellent articles in the Appendices to the Monthly Review, and his admirable translations from Bürger, Wieland, and Goethe gave a direction to his vague studies, and turned the whole course of his future life. These various writings were a few years since collected by Mr. Taylor, and published under the title of an ‘Historic Survey of German poetry,‘ on which an article appeared in the Edinburgh Review for March, 1831, written in the bitterest spirit of that mordacious publication.

The author of this article was Thomas Carlyle. He called Taylor's Survey a huge, anomalous mass, no section of it like another, oriel-window alternating with rabbit-hole, wrought capital on pillar of dried mud; etc., etc.

³³ This suggestion was followed in the printing.

³⁴ The rest of the P. S. has no bearing on German literature.

³⁵ The paper for September, No. 4, as printed, contains only a part of Vol. 9, comprising Tosso and Die natürliche Tochter. The October number, No. 5, gives a catalogue of volumes 10 and 11. The November number contains Faust.

³⁶ Cf. preceding note.

³⁷ The exact references in the beginning of this sentence are not clear, but the general thought is plain.

³⁸ Evidently the portion sent at this time, however, plus an amount sent later “to finish the 11th Vol.,” was finally divided into two parts and distributed between the September and October numbers (see note 35). There is no “laying by” until we get to the December number.

³⁹ An old friend of Robinson, mentioned several times in his diary. In the reminiscences for 1794, “Will” Pattison is cited as a contributor to the Cabinet, to which Robinson had contributed his first essay. See Diary, i, pp. 15-16.

⁴⁰ Presumably, because it would appear then as if Faust were the cause of the discontinuance.

⁴¹ Printed in the October number of the Monthly Repository for 1832, pp. 699-705. Since this is the beginning of September, it follows that, unless it was printed elsewhere first,—which is not probable—Robinson must have read it either in manuscript or in proof.

⁴² It is impossible to determine from the manuscript whether this name is Strutt or Shutt. Both names are mentioned in Robinson's Diary, but without the necessary particulars.

⁴³ Cf. next two letters. Samuel Naylor Jr. translated Goethe's Reineke Fuchs (1845).

⁴⁴ We know this from the extract of a letter, written Sept. 11, 1832. It has proved impossible thus far to procure or even locate this letter. The following quotation from its contents, however, taken from a catalogue of old manuscripts (No. 266, March 1911, p. 84), published by Maggs Brothers, London, when the letter was still for sale, will, in a measure, bridge the gap between No. VIII and No. IX:—“Brighton, 11th Sept., 1832.

“I send you Faust. You may form some idea of the labour it has cost me, by the state of the copy, which however I trust I have left legible at least.”

“Faust is so important that dignitatis causa I have thought it right to swell the article out so that it may fill up the requisite quantity alone. I was induced to strike out some impudent attacks on the Trinity, from fear of raising clamour against Göthe. What think you of the framing out of it ‘The Witches’ Multiplication Table'!!”

⁴⁵ Such as das unsterbliche, p. 598; guschen for zu sehen, p. 604; Die Fischerinn, p. 686; Vorspeil, p. 688.

⁴⁶ One would hardly call this blunder “ludicrous.” Only a German scholar, I think, would ever suspect that Die Fischerin, an opera, was performed in the natural theater at Tiefurt instead of in the national.

⁴⁷ The initial “W” does not appear in the last letter, but there is no doubt about the identity of the man.

⁴⁸ This plan was not followed, however. Instead of that, the months of December and January are skipped entirely and the remaining three numbers are published, successively, in February, March, and April.

⁴⁹ Cf. preceding note. Only three numbers were made.

⁵⁰ We learn later that Robinson had written some extra articles during the summer, but by common consent they were not printed. See next letter.

⁵¹ Cf. the following extract from an undated, unpublished, supplementary letter which was written, it seems, immediately after this one. I am indebted to a Maggs Brothers catalogue for the extract. See Catalogue No. 269 (Summer, 1911), p. 116. “I [Robinson] sat down to look over my article for this month [February, 1833] with the intention to pare down what I had written, but I found it difficult.”

“One long note on German and Italian politics, I could myself have been content to strike out, but was withheld by the reflection that your magazine, being now distinctly political this note, tho' it has little or nothing to do with G(oethe), may interest your readers.”

“The next article for March will consist of two famous works [Wilhelm Meister and Dichtung und Wahrheit] and the rest may be rapidly got over” …

⁵² Cf. preceding note.

⁵³ Characteristics of Goethe in three volumes, 1833. Cf. notes 1 and 24, also letter No. XIV.

⁵⁴ In an undated, unpublished letter to Fox from the latter part of February, 1833, Robinson had written: “When the (posthumous) works appear, I will, if you like it, give an account of them, but not unless you like it. For tho' it is unpleasant not to use any material already worked up for use, yet I have not the least care about writing. Unless you had asked me, I had never thought of exercising myself as I have done. But I have had a pleasure in doing it. Not having the ordinary motive for writing, and being little of a party man, I want a stimulus ab contra to do anything.”

“In the next number 9 there will be an account of Winkelmann, the great Archaeologist”—(See Maggs Brothers catalogue for Oct., 1911, No. 270, p. 61).

⁵⁵ The remainder of the letter does not deal with Goethe, but a part of it is introduced to show Robinson's wide literary interest.

⁵⁶ The periodical had by this time assumed a more distinct literary and political character. Cf. note 7.

⁵⁷ Such as Hermann und Dorothea and Reineke Fuchs.

⁵⁸ A. W. Schlegel, Lectures on the Drama; F. Schlegel, Lectures on the History of Literature. Cf. Monthly Repository for 1833, p. 281, note. Robinson refers to these works as follows: “A. W. Schlegel's ‘Lectures on the Drama,’ which contain the most admirable development that has ever appeared of the excellences of Shakespeare. F. Schlegel's ‘Lectures on the History of Literature,’ a work more highly esteemed in Germany, but more metaphysical and less popular than the book of his brother.”

⁵⁹ That is, Robinson.

⁶⁰ Presumably such men as Falk and von Müller, from whom Mrs. Austin procured most of her material.

⁶¹ With the material in the last two sentences, compare the following extract from the first paragraph in Robinson's review: “We shall practice the self-denial of leaving unnoticed the coincidences in opinion which we have had the pleasure of remarking, where there could have been no interchange of thought; and the few discrepancies of statement are not important enough to occupy space that may be more agreeably filled by extracts” (Monthly Repository for March, 1834, p. 177).

⁶² It has proved impossible thus far to determine the exact date of composition, but it was printed the following March. Cf. preceding note.

⁶³ William Bridges Adams (1797-1872), a red-hot radical and writer on political subjects, evidently the polar-opposite of Goethe.