New, interdisciplinary essays on an array of topics ranging from Goethe and mineralogy to theories of masculinity around 1800. The Goethe Yearbook, first published in 1982, is a publication of the Goethe Society of North America and is dedicated to North American Goethe Scholarship. It aims above all to encourage and publish original English-language contributions to the understanding of Goethe and other authors of the Goethezeit, while also welcoming contributions from scholars around the world. Goethe Yearbook 15 features an array of interdisciplinary essays,among them articles on Goethe and such topics as architecture, mineralogy, theatrical improvisation, and Ulrich von Hutten. Readers will also find two astute and erudite interpretations of key poems, Alexis und Dora and Urworte. Orphisch, as well as a compelling exploration of the legal, social, and economic issues pertaining to the question: "Why Did Goethe Marry When He Did?" An interpretation of Goethe's Elective Affinities, two essays on Schiller's plays, and an incisive analysis by Peter Uwe Hohendahl titled "The New Man: Theories of Masculinity Around 1800" round out the volume. Contributors: Ehrhard Bahr, Yasser Derwiche Djazaerly, Robert Germany, Albert E. Gurganus, Peter Uwe Hohendahl, Jocelyn Hollnad, Borge Kristiansen, Elizabeth Powers, Daniel Purdy, Peter J. Schwartz, and Christoph Schweitzer Simon J. Richter is Professor of German at the University ofPennsylvania, and Daniel Purdy is Associate Professor of German at Pennsylvania State University. Book review editor Martha B. Helfer is Professor of German at Rutgers University.

The president of New York University offers a love letter to America's most beloved sport and a tribute to its underlying spirituality.
For more than a decade, John Sexton has taught a wildly popular New York University course about two seemingly very different things: religion and baseball. Yet Sexton argues that one is actually a pathway to the other.
"Baseball as a Road to God" is about touching that something that lies beyond logical understanding. Sexton illuminates the surprisingly large number of mutual concepts shared between baseball and religion: faith, doubt, conversion, miracles, and even sacredness among many others.
Structured like a game and filled with riveting accounts of baseball's most historic moments, "Baseball as Road to God" will enthrall baseball fans whatever their religious beliefs may be. In thought-provoking, beautifully rendered prose, Sexton elegantly demonstrates that baseball is more than a game, or even a national pastime: It can be a road to enlightenment.