Just 'Farewell Performances'? Curiosity in Eighteenth-Century German Literature and its Role in the Creation of a Specific Genre of Political Theatre

Abstract

This article focuses on curiosity's career in eighteenth-century German literature, thus counteracting the commonly held view that curiosity left the centre stage in cultural and literary debates quickly after 1700. Examining texts ranging from the anonymous Centi-Folium Stultorum to works of manifold genres, types, and backgrounds by authors such as Lang, Schnabel, Gellert, Loen, Belach, Frederick II, Haller, Vulpius, Seume, Breitinger, Grosser, Keilhacker and Borkenstein, it shows that curiosity's role after 1700 was far from being reduced to just a brief 'farewell performance'. In fact, its position within eighteenth-century culture remains highly complex; while early modern debates about curiosity were unforgotten and continued to be reflected in literary works, 'practices' of curiosity spread, Neugier was hailed as a key element in securing literature's success as one of the Artes populares, and it played a pivotal part in creating a particular and innovative type of early Enlightenment political drama that has (wrongfully) received hardly any attention as of yet although it dared to stage the rationale and strategies behind contemporary European politics of war.