/lit/ - Literature

"The Chinese think, act, and feel almost exactly like us; and we soon find that we are perfectly like them, except that all they do is more clear, pure, and decorous, than with us."

"With them all is orderly, citizen-like, without great passion or poetic flight"

"They likewise differ from us in that with them external nature is always associated with the human figures. You always hear the goldfish splashing in the pond, the birds are always singing on the bough; the day is always serene and sunny, the night is always clear. There is much talk about the moon; but it does not alter the landscape, its light is conceived to be as bright as day itself; and the interior of the houses is as neat and elegant as their pictures."

"Then there is an infinite number of legends which are constantly introduced into the narrative and are applied almost like proverbs ... There are innumerable other legends, all turning upon what is moral and proper. It is by this severe moderation in everything that the Chinese Empire has sustained itself for thousands of years, and will endure hereafter."


Is he recht?

Why isn't Goethe mentioned here more often, or read by the public at large? And even though writers like Gene Wolfe are memed here, I'm pretty sure Wolfe is still considered hipster-tier. Yet on /lit/, Wolfe is still mentioned at least 3 times more often than Goethe.