Page:A Danish and Dano-Norwegian grammar.djvu/159

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ESSING may be said to have created the modern German stage, and his “Minna” is not only the first real German comedy but also the very best that the German literature has produced.

This edition contains: (I) Introduction. (2) (a) Biographical Sketch; (b) The development of the German drama and Lessing’s influence upon it; (c) The position and influence of this work in German comedy; (d) Synopsis of the characters and their development in the play. (3) Text, followed by Notes and a Bibliography.

F we except Goethe’s Faust, no German poem has received so much special study as Nathan der Weise. It occupies the most prominent place in German Literature, after Faust, and is the most magnificent monument of Lessing’s poetic genius. It deserves a place in the study of German, not only as a work of art, but also for the deep philosophical and scientific truths which it discusses.

The Introduction discusses amply the religious and philosophic back-ground of the drama, and gives a synopsis of the characters with their development in the play. The Notes aim to leave no real difficulty unexplained, and in the light of the best scholarship of to-day to interpret faithfully the thought of the author.