Goethe's tragedy Egmont, about the life and downfall of a glamorous and popular Flemish political leader and brilliant general in the service of Philip II of Spain, was composed in sporadic work over a period of twelve years, a first draft having been set down in 1775, when Goethe was still living at his parents' Frankfurt home and encouraged “day and night” by his republican-minded father. Like Götz von Berlichingen and various fragmentary treatments of Julius Caesar, Mahomet, and the mythical Prometheus, Egmont: A Tragedy in Five Acts reflects Goethe's preoccupation with the lives of great, powerful men (“Kraftkerle”). The original Faust was a product of the same short period of prodigious creative energy and fascination with exceptional human greatness, while The Sufferings of Young Werther, Clavigo, and Stella, written at the same...
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Citation: Dye, Ellis. "Egmont". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 September 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16859, accessed 12 February 2026.]
