“Ich bin für nichts gut” Assessing the Functionality of Paradigmatic Behavior Models for Women in Emilia Galotti
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15173/sj.v1i1.102Abstract
Lessing’s 1771 play has fueled scholarly debates for centuries.Over all, conventional interpretations of Emilia Galotti fall
into three basic categories: traditionally, scholars associate
the bourgeois tragedy with the much older Roman legend of
Virginia (Woesler, McInnes), some read it as a father’s dilemma
in protecting his daughter’s innocence (Schenkel, Witte, Prutti),
whereas still other scholars view the play as a testimony to the
bourgeois struggle for emancipation (Janson, Wittowski,
Bollacher). However, reexamining the drama in the context of
women’s socialization, while bearing in mind the manner in
which eighteenth-century women of the middle class were
conditioned to negotiate interior and exterior spaces unveils
further exciting narrative perspectives
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