. A history of all nations from the earliest times; being a universal historical library . the French classics as models, not at all discern-iiio- their real merits, but criticising them in an entirely formal androughly external manner. In vain has the attempt been made re-cently to place Gottsched« shallow pedantrj-in a favorable light;the approval with which his compendium met during the first twodecades after its appearance is to be ascribed to the general prefer-ence for the Frencli language in the Germany of that day. Of a purely negative character, also, is tlie merit of the dramasby Got
. A history of all nations from the earliest times; being a universal historical library . the French classics as models, not at all discern-iiio- their real merits, but criticising them in an entirely formal androughly external manner. In vain has the attempt been made re-cently to place Gottsched« shallow pedantrj-in a favorable light;the approval with which his compendium met during the first twodecades after its appearance is to be ascribed to the general prefer-ence for the Frencli language in the Germany of that day. Of a purely negative character, also, is tlie merit of the dramasby Gottsched and his friends that appeared in the German Stage,which he edited. These people, who could not \\Tite dramas atall, succeeded only in dri%dng the silly and ribald harlequinades 154 GERMANY UNDER THE LAST OF TBE HAPSBURGS. off the Gei-man stage. Whatever the Gottsched society itself pro-duced was in the highest degree Üat, stupid, and clumsy. Eventheir translations from the French aie mere caricatures of the origi-nal. Among all of Gottscheds circle only his ^vife, Louisa Kul-. Fio. 23. — .Johanu .Jakob Bodmer. From a copper-plate engraving; by J. I- Bause(1738-1814); original painting by A. Grail (1736-1813). mus, showed in this field wit and originality, at least in comedy,where, with keen and just perceptions, she satirized the weaknessesof her contemporaries. But jjrecisely for this reason she fell outwith her husband, whose inflated emptiness she painfully perceivedtoward the end of her comparatively short life (1713-1762). BOmiER AND BREITINGER. 155 With his exclusively Frenchified and rationalizing efforts, Gott-sched happily found a spirited opposition to his views in the Zurichwriters, Jakob Bodmer (Fig. 23) and Jakob Breitinger (Fig. 24),who had formerly joined him in his contest with the • Silesians.
Size: 1335px × 1872px
Photo credit: © Reading Room 2020 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookaut, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectworldhistory
