Appendix to the Public Lectures
GA 85
7 November 1899, Zurich
Translated by Steiner Online Library
40. Goethe and Women
[ 1 ] At the first association meeting held on the 7th of this month, Dr. Rudolf Steiner of Berlin spoke about Goethe and women. Dr. Steiner concluded that, to Goethe—both as a poet and as a man—women had meant nothing more than a means of stimulating and inspiring his imagination.
[ 2 ] He transformed each of his romantic encounters into some form of poetic artwork, and thus, for him, their value was exhausted. The question of a woman’s own individual right to exist had remained unknown to this great connoisseur of women, and it is interesting for the development of this question to note that it has only gained recognition in our time and could have remained foreign to a man of Goethe’s stature.