Corporeal Eloquence and Sensate Cognition: G. E. Lessing, Acting Theory, and Properly Feeling Bodies in Eighteenth-Century Germany

Abstract

Most know Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729–81) for his dramatic theory, specifically that which is found in his periodical the Hamburg Dramaturgy (1767–69), a collection of 101 essays that has since earned Lessing the moniker of “the first dramaturg.” Many are also familiar with Lessing's major plays, Miss Sara Sampson (1755), Minna von Barnhelm (1767), Emilia Galotti (1772), and Nathan the Wise (1779). Fewer, however, may be familiar with his acting theory and his long association with actors, an association that began in his college years and which so disturbed Lessing's father that the respectable pastor lured the wayward student home by falsely claiming that Lessing's mother was ill. During his time as a university student in Leipzig, Lessing translated plays for the troupe of Karoline Neuber (1697–1760) and socialized with the company's actors; over time he would continue to accrue significant firsthand knowledge of actors and the art of acting, not only through his frequent theatregoing but also through the coaching of his own plays. Lessing's familiarity with actors and acting informs both his performance and dramatic theory, including that which one finds in the Hamburg Dramaturgy; in Anglophone studies of Lessing's journal, however, one infrequently sees Lessing's dramatic theory placed in conversation with his acting theory, reception theory, or performance reviews. Due to the short and contentious life of the Hamburg National Theatre, the experimental theatre project to which the Hamburg Dramaturgy was ostensibly attached, historical narratives more often focus on Lessing's strained relations with the actors of the Hamburg acting company. If one views Lessing's writing about performance solely in terms of a frustrated critic's attempts to rein in “unruly” actors, however, one loses sight of how Lessing's acting theory supports his wider ideas about the form and function of theatre and about how the Hamburg Dramaturgy and the Hamburg theatre experiment might function as a force for social change.