Tragedy in Paradise: Family and Gender Politics in German Bourgeois Tragedy 1750-1850

By Gail K. Hart

Examination of the German genre of bourgeois tragedy', bringing out its underlying characteristics.

B?rgerliches Trauerspiel' or bourgeois tragedy is the most popularly acclaimed and critically documented form of German drama. From the mid-eighteenth century, some of Germany's greatest dramatists turned away from classical subjects to focus instead on the intricate internecine struggles of the middle-class family. This book views bourgeois tragedy and related forms of 'family' drama as depicting the enactment of a threat to stability and domestic order, organised so that the threat is defeated and the anxieties of the predominantly middle-class audience relieved; the author argues that these threats are represented as emanating from female figures who oppose and challenge the authority and order of a father or husband. Texts examined include Klinger's Sturm und Drang, Goethe's Stella and Die nat?rliche Tochter, Kleist's '?ber das Marionettentheater' and Hebbel's Maria Magdalene.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1571130373
• ISBN13: 9781571130372
• Release Date: May 1996
• Publisher: Camden House (NY)
• Length: 150 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.2" x 9.2"