Lessing, Thomson und die Renaissance der frühneuzeitlichen Tragödie

Abstract To the extent that the domestic tragedy ( bürgerliches Trauerspiel ) is understood as the antithesis of classicist tragedy, Lessing, as the main representative of this genre, is seen as an overcomer of heroic-political traditions. Lessing’s Vorrede zu des Herrn Jakob Thomson Sämtliche Trauerspiele (1756), little noticed so far, suggests to revise these arguments. In particular, Lessing’s reading of Thomson’s tragedy Sophonisbe (1730) allows us to recognise those poetological reflections that are developed in Miss Sara Sampson (1755) and further explicated in the Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel . To put it more concretely: in his examination of Thomson’s tragedies, Lessing drafts a concept of domestic tragedy that is by no means based on overcoming classicist tragedy, but on its transformation. Thus, Lessing’s dramaturgic concept builds on the model of Roman heroism and transforms it by returning to an ideal of Greek ‘simplicity’, meant to evoke humanity and pity.