Italian Journey 1786-1788

Goethe's account of his passage through Italy from 1786 to 1788 is a great travel chronicle as well as a candid self-portrait of a genius in the grip of spiritual crisis.
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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was born in 1749. Having studied at Leipzig and Strassburg, he began to write some essays and lyrical verse, and at twenty-four wrote a play Goetz von Berlichingen, which brought him national fame and established him in the Sturm und Drang movement. He is most famous for his tragedy Werther. He died in 1832.
W. H. Auden was Professor of Poetry at Oxford University from 1956 to 1960. He published poems throughout his life, and in 1946 became a US citizen. He died in 1973.
Elizabeth Mayer has also translated, in collaboration with Louise Bogan, Elective Affinities and Werther.