Goethe and Anna Amalia: A Forbidden Love?

Edited by : Translated by Dan Farrelly

Publication Date 8th, June, 2007

ISBN 978-1-904505-24-2

Cost €25.00

In this study Ghibellino sets out to show that the platonic relationship between Goethe and Charlotte von Stein – lady-in-waiting to Anna Amalia, the Dowager Duchess of Weimar – was used as part of a cover-up for Goethe’s intense and prolonged love-relationship with the Duchess Anna Amalia herself. The book attempts to uncover a hitherto closely guarded state secret. Readers convinced by the evidence supporting Ghibellino’s hypothesis will see in it one of the very great love stories in European history – to rank with that of Dante and Beatrice, and Petrarch and Laura. The publication of the German edition in 2003 casued a sensation in some circles.