Why Bertuch? In the Weimar of Goethe and Carl August, Friedrich Justin Bertuch (1747-1822) was an important and still largely underestimated figure. He was privy chancellor and private secretary to the Duke, author, translator and editor, bookseller, publisher, industrialist and, not least, a local politician and political pamphleteer. The articles reflect his many-sided gifts and activities alongside the programmatic and practical tenacity he displayed in all his doings. It was this latter quality that enabled him to assert himself in a challenging environment, not only personally and economically but as a conceptual and (temporarily at least) political force to be reckoned with.