December 28, 1934 page 7 Goethe's Slippers and Shakespeare's Socks _____ The reverence for the spiritual heroes of the past occasionally takes on forms which cause the sober observer to smile. One of the most comical and enthusiastic homages is the clinging to harmless objects which once were in the possession of the great individual and now are acquired and preserved as relics of a specific kind. So it is with a pair of red velvet slippers belonging to Goethe, which have come into the possession of many owners and were displayed with reverence and wonder. These slippers are of a special sort. The name "Suleika" is embroidered in black on gold and a west-eastern patriarchal mood hovers around the dainty, comfortable footwear, which carry the names of the wonderfully celebrated lovers in West-Eastern Divan. In Karlsbad in 1795 a female gift-giver* was quite taken with State Minister von Goethe and she sent him a gift so "the Privy Counsellor would not soon forget her." Through the years she met him again and often gave him gifts, among which were the slippers. Goethe's slippers! Such esteem for such an everyday object, for in the end a slipper is in no way a rarity. The brilliant philologist Rudolf Hildebrand once mentioned wanting to establish an entirely new, scholarly branch of science concerning a "button belonging to Goethe," but on further reflection he ironically commented, it would be better to go with Schiller because someone had preserved an entire vest with a full set of buttons. What jubilation prevailed at the time when the Leipzig Schiller Society acquired this relic! It prompted young Theodore Fontane to climb up on Pegasus and compose a hymn concerning "Shakespeare's Socks." "Loudly praised, highly prized, Even if moldy with rot. See what we have acquired, William Shakespeare's socks. Behold, we have them now, Holy things saved from harm. He wore them in swamps and marshes Keeping his tootsies warm. So let us honor his footwear Which rose almost to his trunk. A couple of inches longer, And they would have covered his rump. Behold, his wonderous hosiery, Which he scrubbed, and rinsed, and dried. Countless times redarning, As he Hamlet scribed..." _____ *[Translator's Note: The slipper donor might have been Marianne von Willimer.]