The preparation of this translation and introduction of Novalis' manuscript has been a lengthy and somewhat daunting enterprise, during the course of which I have become indebted to many generous and helpful folk. I would especially like to thank the series editor, Karl Ameriks, and editor Hilary Gaskin at Cambridge University Press for advice, encouragement, and patience that bordered on the saintly. Pauline Marsh did an extraordinary job with the painstaking work of copy-editing the typescript and was a joy to work with at all times. I am extremely grateful to Mathias Thierbach for his diligent work on a final reading of the translation, and also to Noell Birondo for compiling the index. Violetta Waibel gave extremely helpful last-minute advice on Novalis' reference to “players” in #445, as well as other useful suggestions and moral support.

Finally I want to thank my colleagues in the Department of Philosophy at Colorado State University, who never doubted the worthiness of this time-consuming and somewhat unorthodox philosophical enterprise. I owe special thanks to James Maffie for encouraging me to take on the project, and to Michael Losonsky for insisting that I finish.