“Greenberg has accomplished a magnificent literary feat. He has taken a great German work, until now all but inaccessible to English readers, and made it into a sparkling English poem, full of verve and wit. Greenberg's translation lives ; it is done in a modern idiom but with respect for the original text; I found it a joy to read.”—Irving Howe (on the earlier edition) A classic of world literature, Goethe’s Faust is a philosophical and poetic drama full of satire, irony, humor, and tragedy. Martin Greenberg re-creates not only the text’s varied meter and rhyme but also its diverse tones and styles—dramatic and lyrical, reflective and farcical, pathetic and coarse, colloquial and soaring. His rendition of Faust is the first faithful, readable, and elegantly written translation of Goethe’s masterpiece available in English. At last, the Greenberg Faust is available in a single volume, together with a thoroughly updated translation, preface, and notes.     "Greenberg is quite remarkable, and at his best truly brilliant, in evoking the poetic ‘feel’ of Goethe’s original. I do not believe that any other version of Faust has attempted anything quite like it."—Cyrus Hamlin, Yale University (on the earlier edition of Part One) "Goethe’s Faust is an enigmatic and perhaps barely translatable masterpiece. Its grotesque and exuberant part 2 must be the most outrageous poem in the western canon. Martin Greenberg’s revised version conveys the outrage yet also shows again and again why the poem does stand with the major works of the western tradition."—Harold Bloom "Greenberg has accomplished a magnificent literary feat. He has taken a great German work, until now all but inaccessible to English readers, and made it into a sparkling English poem, full of verve and wit. Greenberg's translation  lives ; it is done in a modern idiom but with respect for the original text; I found it a joy to read."—Irving Howe Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) was a German poet, novelist, playwright, and politician. Martin Greenberg is best known for his translations of Goethe and von Kleist. He won a citation from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and received the Harold Morton Landon Verse Translation Award from the American Academy of Poets. W. Daniel Wilson is professor of German at Royal Holloway, University of London. Faust A Tragedy Parts One & Two Fully Revised By Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, Martin Greenberg Yale UNIVERSITY PRESS Copyright © 2013 Martin Greenberg All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-300-18969-8 Contents Introduction by W. Daniel Wilson, ix, Translator's Note, xix, FAUST: A TRAGEDY, Part One, 3, Part Two, 169, Notes, 443, CHAPTER 1 "In the beginning was the Deed!" PRELUDE IN THE THEATER Manager, Poet, Clown MANAGER. You two who've always stood by me When times were hard and the playhouse empty, What do you think we may hope for From this tour of ours through German country? I'd like to please the crowd here, for They're really so easy-going, so patient, The posts are up, the floorboards laid, And all looking forward to the entertainment. Staring about, composed, at ease, They hope for a real surprise, each one, I know with this audience how to please, But I've never been in a fix like this one. It's true what they're used to is pretty bad But Lord, what a terrible lot they've read. So how surprise them with something lively and new, A piece with some meaning that amuses them too? I don't deny what pleases me most Are droves of people, a great host, Trying with all their might to squeeze Through the strait gate to our paradise, When it's daylight still, not even four, Using elbow and fist to get to the ticket seller, Like starving men rushing the baker's door— For the sake of a seat prepared to commit murder. Who works such a wonder on such a mixture Of people? Why, of course it's the poet, So fall to, dear colleague, and let's see you do it! POET. Don't talk to me about that crazy crowd, One look at them and all my wits desert me! Oh shield me from that shoving, shouting horde That swallows you up against your will completely! No, lead me to some quiet, remote place Where poets only know real happiness, Where love and precious friends inspire and nurse The blessed gift that is the power of verse. Oh dear, what struggles up from deep inside us, Syllables our lips shape hesitantly Into scenes ineffective now, and now effective, Is drowned out in the present's hurlyburly; Years must pass till, seen in time's perspective, Its shape and soul shine forth as they are truly. What's all flash and glitter lives a day, The real thing's treasured by posterity. CLOWN. Posterity! Oh that word—don't let's start a row! If all I ever thought of was the hereafter, Who'd set the audience laughing in the here and now? To be amused, that's their hearts' desire. Having a clown on the stage who knows wha