everence for nature and feelings about love, disrupt his ability to involve himself with the townspeople in the story. His disdain for the Princeís superficial knowledge of art, for example, demonstrates his inability to tolerate anyone who does not share his artistic inspiration. He empathizes with many of the characters in the story, including the mother at Walheim and the schizophrenic who fell in love with Lotte, but his relationship with them is hardly mutual. His involvement with the mother, for example, only provides him with a subject for contemplation while, in the case of the schizophrenic, the relationship only serves to underscore his own sense of dejection while arousing a sense of pity. No where in the story does Werther find an equal or a superior. Even Lotte, in the end, lacks the powers necessary to resolve his passion and longings. Other than his artistic abilities, psychological difficulties along Freudian lines seem to hinder Wertherís ability to interact with others as well. The language of the novel constantly associates Wertherís love with motherly love. For example, he falls in love, presumably at first sight, with Lotte when he sees her carrying out the maternal duty of serving bread to her brothers and sisters. His written promise to Lotte that he will visit her mother in heaven after he commits suicide and his references to the innocence of children in his letters to Wilhelm are all signs of a socially disruptive Oedipal dilemma.. Class distinctions also isolate Werther. Goethe appropriately places Werther in a position between the lower and higher classes, making it more difficult to find his place in the social hierarchy. His middle-class status first plagues him in town where the lower classes fear he is trying to condescend to their level. His forced exit from a gathering of social elites during his tenure with the ambassador especially increases his sense of isolation as well as his bitterness about ...