/lit/ - Literature

http://www.theatrehistory.com/german/goethe005.html
>During Goethe's stay in Strasburg he conceived what he imagined to be an imperishable affection for Frederike, the daughter of a village parson, a simple and worthy man... Frederike was but sixteen years of age, tall and slight, with fair hair and blue eyes, and she seems to have fallen headlong in love with Goethe, who was then only twenty-one. He addressed a number of songs to her, ten of which are found in the collection of his works. He devoted to her much of the time which he should have given to his studies, and in the winter neither storm nor cold nor darkness could keep him from riding over to the village, though twenty miles away. But when, after taking his degree, the time approached for leaving Strasburg, he felt that his love was merely a dream, that it could have no serious termination. Frederike endeavored to treat the matter in the same light, and it was only in her letters that she afterward betrayed the depth and reality of her passion.

>Passing by other attachments, we come to his lifelong devotion to Charlotte von Stein, a lady of the court at Weimar, wife of the master of the horse, thirty-three years of age and the mother of seven children. With all these drawbacks, Goethe's affection was undoubtedly sincere, and at the same time perfectly innocent. His letters to her extend over a period of fifty years; he called her by the most endearing epithets; and for years he made her acquainted with his every action and almost with his every thought. Most of his writings at this time were for the dramatic entertainment of the court, including a series of masks or ballets for the birthday of the grand-duchess Louise, two melodramas and several operettas. But his relations with Frau von Stein, though harmless, became every year more full of danger, and it was partly to escape from this influence that Goethe undertook his journey to Italy.

>While wandering aimlessly in one of the parks near Rome, Goethe was accosted by a young girl, named Christiane Vulpius, who presented him with a petition in favor of her brother. She was a comely damsel, with golden curling locks, rosy cheeks, laughing eyes and a neatly rounded figure. The poet took her to his home, and she became his wife in conscience and the mother of his children, though he did not marry her until 1806, when the terrors of the French occupation made him anxious for his eldest son. She had little education, and he could not take her into society; but she was a good and loving wife, and her quick mother-wit fitted her for an intellectual companion. To these days of his early wedded life belong the Roman elegies, which, though Italian in form, in color and sensuality, were written in German from home experiences.

Unlikely it was 35, milf Stein and him probably hooked up and that's why he went to Rome, even if he says otherwise in his autobiography. Still, hardly an incel.

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