"Oh! that I could express, that I could describe, these great conceptions, with the same warmth, with the same energy, that they are impressed on my soul!" [Literal translation: "Oh could you only express, could you the breathe forth upon this paper all that lives so warm and full, that it might become the mirror of your soul, as your soul is the mirror of the infinite God!"]
Die Leiden des jungen Werther [The Sorrows of Young Werther]
An international bestseller with 27 entries for the uniform title "Leiden des jungen Werthers. English" in the ESTC (1779, 1780, 1781, 1782, 1783, 1784, 1785, 1786, 1787, 1788, 1789, 1790, 1791, 1793, 1794, 1795, 1796, 1799).<br>
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I consulted, concurrently, the German and eighteenth-century English translations. See Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, <u>The Sorrows of Werter: a German Story</u>. 2 vols (London: Printed for J. Dodsley, 1779), &lt;<a href="http://find.galegroup.com/ecco/infomark.do?&source=gale&prodId=ECCO&userGroupName=viva_uva&tabID=T001&docId=CW109412717&type=multipage&contentSet=ECCOArticles&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE">Link to ECCO</a>&gt;. But, note, the translation is not always literal; the translator repeatedly tones down Werther's figurative language (especially, it seems, in the second volume): "A few expressions which had this appearance [of extravagance] have been omitted by the French, and a few more by the English translator, as they might possibly give offence in a work of this nature" (Preface).<br>
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Searching English text from a 1784 printing (Dodsley, "A New Edition") in Google Books &lt;<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=rNkFAAAAQAAJ">Link to volume I</a>&gt;&lt;<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=wdkFAAAAQAAJ">Link to voume II</a>&gt;<br>
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Reading <u>Die Leiden des jungen Werther</u> (Stuttgart: Reclam, 2002). German text from <a href="http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/3636/1">http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/3636/1</a>. Printed in 1774 in Leipzig, Weygand'sche Buchhandlung.