Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), German poet, dramatist, and scientist, studied art and music while working as a newspaper critic. In 1776, he was appointed privy council to the duke of Saxe-Weimar and was ennobled in 1782. While pursuing his studies in science, he discovered the intermaxillary bone in man in 1784 and formulated a vertebral theory of the skull. Between 1786 and 1790 he became preoccupied with poetical form. Goethe's masterpiece, his version of Marlowe's "Faust," which he began in 1775, was completed in 1832. A towering influence on German literature, he died in 1832 in Weimar.