The Man of Fifty Hesperus Press, 2004. “…under the comedy is a chill sense of the inexorable nature of human ageing, of the meaning of being fifty.” -- A.S. Byatt “…a subtle and contemporary translation…” -- Times Literary Supplement Goethe’s work on this piece about old age spanned the entirety of his old age. It is a narrative marked by a lack of time, told by a narrator who is always in a hurry. The Man of Fifty captures that experience of death in life, the temporally and emotionally complex experience of old age for which we have surprisingly few narratives. Almost two hundred years ago, Goethe was asking questions about what it meant for a society to be defined by being old, a demographic truth that has become overwhelmingly real in Western nations with their teetering systems of social security. Goethe acutely sensed how the coupling of vanity and technology would have a profound impact on our social structures, our families and our love affairs. The story of the major’s ‘rejuvenation servant’ and the magical ‘cosmetics case’ – the temptations of perfection and perpetuity – will undoubtedly serve as a key cautionary tale as we enter the Age of Enhancement. To read more of the introduction, click here.