German literature

Introduction
Origins and Middle Ages
- Pre-Christian and early Christian periods
- High courtly literature: Middle High German Classicism
  - The lyric poetry of courtly love
  - Courtly romance
    - Hartmann von Aue
    - Wolfram von Eschenbach
    - Gottfried von Strassburg
    - Nibelungenlied
- Post-Classical Middle High German literature
Late Middle Ages and early Renaissance
- Reformation
- The Baroque
The 18th century
- Age of Enlightenment
  - Rationalism
  - Early Enlightenment
  - Enlightenment
    - Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
    - Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock and Christoph Martin Wieland
    - Johann Gottfried von Herder
  - Late Enlightenment (Sturm und Drang)
- Weimar Classicism: Goethe and Schiller
- Post-Classicism
  - Goethe and the Romantics
  - Jean Paul, Friedrich Hölderlin, and Heinrich von Kleist
The 19th century
- The Romantic Movement
- Realist modes
  - Bourgeois Realism
  - Theodor Fontane
  - 19th-century drama
  - Naturalism
- Fin de siècle movements
  - Friedrich Nietzsche
  - Aestheticism
The 20th century
- German Modernism
  - Expressionism
  - Franz Kafka
  - Other works of German Modernism
- The post-1945 period: “Stunde Null”
- The late 1950s and the ’60s
- The 1970s and ’80s
- Postmodernism
- After reunification
- The turn of the 21st century

References & Edit History Related Topics

Images & Videos

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

How Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's love affairs inspired his work

An exploration of Theodor Storm's The Dykemaster

Two black-and-white portraits of a mustached man flank handwritten notes; overlay text reads “Who was Friedrich Nietzsche?”

German literature: Media

Videos

How Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's love affairs inspired his work

How Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's love affairs inspired his work

Learn how Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's failed love affairs inspired his works.

Video: Contunico © ZDF Studios GmbH, Mainz

An exploration of Theodor Storm's The Dykemaster

An exploration of Theodor Storm's The Dykemaster

A discussion of Theodor Woldsen Storm's The Rider on the White Horse (also...

Video: Contunico © ZDF Studios GmbH, Mainz

Two black-and-white portraits of a mustached man flank handwritten notes; overlay text reads “Who was Friedrich Nietzsche?”

Answering Your Questions About Friedrich Nietzsche

This is the philosopher who said “God is dead.”

Video: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Images

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, oil painting by Joseph Karl Stieler, 1828; in the Neue...

Courtesy of the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen/Bavarian State Painting Collections, Neue Pinakothek (WAF 1048)

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