Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was friends with Friedrich Schiller in the late 1700s.
Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller ( [ ˈjoːhan ˈkʁɪstɔf ˈfʁiːdʁɪç fɔn ˈʃɪlɐ ] ; 10 November 17599 May 1805 ) was a German poet , philosopher , physician , historian , and playwright . Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ( [ ˈgɜːrtə ] [ ˈjoːhan ˈvɔlfɡaŋ fɔn ˈɡøːtə ] ; 28 August 1749 -- 22 March 1832 ) was a German writer and statesman . In 1791 , he was made managing director of the theatre at Weimar , and in 1794 he began a friendship with the dramatist , historian , and philosopher Friedrich Schiller , whose plays he premiered until Schiller 's death in 1805 . His conversations and various common undertakings throughout the 1790s with Schiller , Johann Gottlieb Fichte , Johann Gottfried Herder , Alexander von Humboldt , Wilhelm von Humboldt , and August and Friedrich Schlegel have , in later years , been collectively termed Weimar Classicism .