Talk:Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, now in the public domain.
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Germany, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to articles related to Germany on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please join the project and help with our open tasks.
Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale.
(If you rated the article please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses.)
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]

POV Paragraph:

Klopstock's nature was best attuned to lyrical poetry, and in it his deep, noble character found its truest expression. He was less suited for epic and dramatic representation; for, wrapt up in himself, a stranger to the outer world, without historical culture, and without even any interest in the events of his time, he was lacking in the art of plastic representation such as a great epic requires. Thus the Messias, despite the magnificent passages which especially the earlier cantos contain, cannot satisfy the demands such a theme must necessarily make. The subject matter, the Redemption, presented serious difficulties to adequate epic treatment. The Gospel story was too scanty, and what might have been imported from without and interwoven with it was rejected by the author as profane. He had accordingly to resort to Christian mythology; and here again, circumscribed by the dogmas of the Church, he was in danger of trespassing on the fundamental truths of the Christian faith. The personality of Christ could scarcely be treated in an individual form, still less could angels and devils; and in the case of God Himself it was impossible. The result was that, despite the groundwork--the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Revelation of St John, and the model ready to hand in Milton's Paradise Lost--material elements are largely wanting and the actors in the poem, divine and human, lack plastic form. That the poem took twenty-five years to complete could not but be detrimental to its unity of design; the original enthusiasm was not sustained until the end, and the earlier cantos are far superior to the latter.

This entire paragraph is extremely biased--purely POV stuff, and unsourced at that. I think the only solution is found in answering the question: how soon can it be deleted? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.83.249.234 (talk) 06:13, 1 November 2007 (UTC)