Title: Faust (Parts One and Two)
Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, George Madison Priest (trans.), Engelbert Siebertz (illus.)
Publisher: The Franklin Library, 1981
Condition: Quarter leather-bound. Hardcover, leather spine with cloth boards. New, but with minor foxing on blank fly pages.
This book features:
Premium tooled blue quarter leather binding
Genuine 22k gold gilt to all edges, front design, spine, and back
Marbled endsheets
Satin bookmark, sewn-in
Hubbed spine with raised bands
Smyth-sewn binding for durability
Premium acid-neutral archival paper that will not yellow
Faust is Goethe’s most famous work and considered by many to be one of the greatest works of German literature.
Goethe completed a preliminary version of Part One in 1806. The 1808 publication was followed by the revised 1828–1829 edition, which was the last to be edited by Goethe himself. Prior to these appeared a partial printing in 1790 of Faust, a Fragment. The earliest forms of the work, known as the Urfaust, were developed between 1772 and 1775; however, the details of that development are no longer entirely clear.
Goethe finished writing Faust Part Two in 1832, the year of his death. In contrast to Faust Part One, the focus here is no longer on the soul of Faust, which has been sold to the devil, but rather on social phenomena such as psychology, history and politics, in addition to mystical and philosophical topics. The second part formed the principal occupation of Goethe’s last years and appeared only posthumously in 1832.
