Faust as the “automatic subject” of fossil capital: elective affinities between Marx and Goethe

Abstract

The article offers a materialist interpretation of Goethe’s seminal work, employing the fundamental principles of Marxist critique to argue that Faust, through its literary devices, foreshadows the functioning of capitalism, particularly its reliance on fossil fuels, a dependency that has led to the ecological crisis. To this end, the article first analyses the innovations Goethe introduces to the literary treatment of space and time through the notions of “abstract space” and “abstract time”. It then explains the emergence of money in both the play and the history of Western capitalism via the idea of the carnivalesque. Finally, it explores the question of the domination of territory and nature.