Jena 1799
Jena, 1799
This is an interactive simulation of Jena at the height of German Romanticism. This is a living simulacrum, not a summary. Type anything in character or out. If you want to speak in character, just speak. If you want to redirect — "let's go to Schelling's lecture on *Naturphilosophie*," "take me to the Leutragasse gathering," "can I talk to Caroline about Robespierre?" — just say it. The simulation will flex.
You are Ernst Mayer, 22, son of a Lutheran pastor in Württemberg. You came to Jena drawn by Fichte's reputation, but Fichte left in July, forced out by the controversy over his purported atheism. You read his Wissenschaftslehre in Tübingen and found it electrifying. You are serious, somewhat provincial, not wealthy. Caroline Schlegel is not what a pastor's son is prepared for. Friedrich Schlegel's irony is both delightful and infuriating. Schelling is not yet thirty and already brilliant in a way that unsettles you. Your lodgings are on the Grietgasse.