…drama, under the title of Hamburgische Dramaturgie (1767–69). Here, too, Lessing argued against tragedy modeled on that of Corneille and Voltaire, although he praised the realism of the contemporary French writer Denis Diderot’s descriptions of middle-class life. Lessing interpreted Aristotle’s concept of tragic catharsis (purging) as meaning the emotional release…

…in his theatre reviews, called Hamburgische Dramaturgie, sprang from critical genius and not mere national resentment. Shakespeare spelled freedom from narrow conventions—the set verse form in couplets, the lofty language and long declamations, the adherence to verse throughout, the exclusion of low characters, comic effects, and violent action—or, in a…

…in his Hamburgische Dramaturgie (1767–69; Hamburg Dramaturgy), asserting that the cathartic emotions of pity and fear are felt by the audience rather than by figures in the drama. With this stress on pity and on compassion, Lessing interpreted Aristotle in terms of Christian middle-class virtues and established Shakespeare as the…

…in his Hamburgische Dramaturgie (1767–69; Hamburg Dramaturgy) sought to accommodate Shakespeare to a new view of Aristotle. With the classical straitjacket removed, there was a release of dramatic energies in new directions. There were still local critical skirmishes, such as Jeremy Collier’s attack on the “immorality and profaneness of the…

Romanticism’s chief innovations in his Hamburg Dramaturgy (1767–69):