„Die Leiden des jungen Werther“ (The Sorrows of young Werther) written by Johann Wolfgang Goethe is a story about unrequited love and presented as a collection of letters written by Werther, a young artist of a sensitive and passionate temperament, to his friend Wilhelm.

Werther moves to the fictional town named Wahlheim, where he meets Lotte, a beautiful young girl who takes care of her siblings after the death of their mother.
Werther falls in love with Lotte despite knowing beforehand that she is engaged to a man named Albert.

Despite the pain it causes him, Werther spends the next few months cultivating a close friendship with them both. His sorrow eventually becomes so unsupportable that he is forced to leave Wahlheim, but he returns later and suffers even more than before, partly because Charlotte and Albert are now married.

Every day becomes a torturing reminder that Charlotte will never be able to requite his love. She, out of pity for her friend and respect for her husband, decides that Werther must not visit her so frequently. He visits her one final time, and they are both overcome with emotion after he recites to her a passage of his own translation of Ossian.

Even before that incident, Werther had hinted at the idea that one member of the love triangle – Charlotte, Albert or Werther himself – had to die to resolve the situation.

Unable to hurt anyone else or seriously consider murder, Werther sees no other choice but to take his own life. After composing a farewell letter to be found after his death, he writes to Albert asking for his two pistols, on the pretext that he is going "on a journey".

Charlotte receives the request with great emotion and sends the pistols. Werther then shoots himself in the head, but does not die until twelve hours later.

He is buried between two lime trees that he had mentioned frequently in his letters.

The funeral is not attended by any clergy, or by Albert or Charlotte. The book ends with an intimation that Charlotte may die of a broken heart: "I shall say nothing of...Charlotte's grief. ... Charlotte's life was despaired of."

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