Zivilisierte Konkurrenz: Die Entstehung der English Goethe Society und ihr Verhältnis zur Goethe-Gesellschaft Weimar

Abstract The English Goethe Society (EGS) is the third oldest Goethe society in the world. Although it was founded solely as a literary society “to promote and extend Goethe’s work and thought,” at certain points in the Society’s history, speakers such as Friedrich Max Müller and Thomas Mann emphasized its political dimensions. This article demonstrates that from its founding in 1886 to the beginning of the First World War, the EGS experienced various crises, not least in its relations with other Goethe societies in Britain and with the Goethe-Gesellschaft in Weimar.