# The Sorrows of Young Werther

The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe has 42,526 words.

## At a glance

1774 epistolary novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

- **Author:** [Johann Wolfgang von Goethe](https://musael.com/books/authors/johann-wolfgang-von-goethe.md) (1749–1832)
- **First published:** 1774
- **Original language:** German
- **Genre:** romance
- **Readers:** adult

## How long it takes to read

- **Words:** 42,526
- **Reading time:** 2 h 50 min (at 250 words a minute)
- **Listening time:** 4 h 34 min (audiobook pace, 155 words a minute)

| Reading speed | Whole book | At 30 minutes a day |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 200 wpm | 3 h 33 min | 8 days |
| 250 wpm | 2 h 50 min | 6 days |
| 300 wpm | 2 h 22 min | 5 days |

## Read or listen

The Sorrows of Young Werther is in the public domain: these editions are free to download, read and share.

- Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/j-w-von-goethe/the-sorrows-of-young-werther/r-d-boylan
- Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2527

## Counted from the text

Automated estimates from the selected Project Gutenberg text; it may include a preface or notes.

- Words in the text: 42,668
- Dialogue: 24% of the words are inside quotation marks
- Average sentence: 17.8 words

## Where the numbers come from

The word count comes from the sources below.

- https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/j-w-von-goethe/the-sorrows-of-young-werther/r-d-boylan (word count)
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2527 (word count)
- https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q151883
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sorrows_of_Young_Werther
- https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20555161W
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2527

Checked on 2026-10-27. Page counts change from edition to edition.

Source: https://musael.com/books/the-sorrows-of-young-werther