This free talk by beloved Aspen professor Tom Buesch will introduce the man Goethe, whose life story is critical as the background to his writings in the areas of science, history, travel, and, personal development. Through poetry, drama, short stories, novels, and personal memoirs Goethe expressed the humanism that both summarized and inspired the development of Western culture. He was chosen as the focus of the 1949 bicentennial convocation in Aspen because he represented the very best in the West, the epitome of what humans are capable of producing in ideas and thoughts that express our essence and the rise of our culture in world history. 

Through anecdotes, stories, quotations, and examples Professor Buesch will explain the appeal of Goethe to the personalities who came to Aspen in June of 1949 to celebrate this man and his accomplishments and to suggest they be used as the foundation for a rebirth of humanism so needed after the tumultuous decades of the early twentieth century.