A Poetic Representation of the North-South Piety in Goethe’s "The God and the Bayadere" (1797)

Abstract

Goethe’s ballad The God and the Bayadere is a poetic excursion into the Indian cultural world. The Bayadere-myth comes from the Indian oral narrative tradition. It was subject of change by the poet and it discusses the North-South piety. Unlike previous research, the goal of the present paper is, while considering the fact that little attention has, until now, been paid to the complexity of the context and of the research history of the ballad, not only to discuss some interpretations, but also to deepen some of them as well to suggest other forms of its reading. This double reading enables to offer other forms of interpretations. In this contribution, some thematic aspects such as „power, love and body“, „localization of redemption paradigms in world religions“, „gender asymmetry of power“, „pluralism, and reversal of perspectives“ as well as the relationship between „secularism, anti-fundamentalism and world religions“ are therefore to be considered and to be critically discussed within the general thematic issue.