ABSTRACT
Among the many discourses on aesthetics that sprang up during the eighteenth century, one of the most curious was the century-long debate over the purpose and character of the German theater. From the enlightened didacticism of the German neoclassical theater to the sublime transcendence of Schiller, the debate raged over the possibilities for and the best uses of the theater. No small portion of this discussion dwelled upon the question of what was actually German in the German theater. Deeply distressed over the lack of a long native-language tradition in literary drama comparable to the legacies of the English and French theaters, a small but influential number of intellectuals urgently began to seek and develop that which was distinctly German, in the hope of infusing a revitalized theater with national spirit.
