258p. Wilhelm Schlegel to Goethe in Weimar: Jena, 8 March 1800 [*]
Jena, 8 March 1800
. . . I cannot express to you how gratified we all were by your having remembered us so cordially. Your kind concern genuinely cheered up Tieck, who on the whole is well on his way to recovering from his malady, and only the return of cold temperatures is constantly setting him back. [1] Unfortunately, my wife has now been sick for more than a week with nervous fever, which at least at the outset caused us grave concern and from which she is still not really recovering very quickly. [2] I myself am still healthy and quite disposed to work on my projects.
That your business obligations are preventing you yourself from getting around to your poetic projects is certainly quite vexing; I do hope you will be able to spend some undisturbed months here in Jena in the spring in order to get back to those things. Surely the coming spring will in every respect make up for what the winter has thwarted. . . .
Notes
[*] Source: Körner-Wieneke 95–96, here 96. Back.
[1] Concerning Goethe’s remarks concerning Ludwig Tieck’s struggles with gout, see Wilhelm’s letter to Goethe on 28 February 1800 (letter 258o), note 5. Back.
[2] This letter as well as Auguste’s letters to Luise Wiedemann on 30 March 1800 (letter 258w) and Luise Gotter on 31 March 1800 (letter 259) date the onset of Caroline’s illness basically to 1 March 1799 (illustration from Christophe Schmid [Christoph von Schmid], La guirlande de houblon [1836], Oeuvres choisies, vol. 4, new ed. [Tours 1867], plate following p. 262):
See those letters concerning some of Caroline’s symptoms. Back.
Translation © 2013 Doug Stott