Nathan der Weise. Ein dramatische Gedicht, in fünf aufzügen (Nathan the Wise. A Dramatic Poem, in Five Acts)
[n.p.]: [n.p.], 1779. First edition. Hardcover. Small octavo. Collation: [pi]2 A-Q8 R6 S4 (= 140 leaves). [4], 276pp. Half dark brown cloth over marbled boards which simulate tree calf (lightly worn with some slight abrasions to covers). Text lightly toned with intermittent mild foxing. Final five leaves partially detached from block, but holding to hinge, else a good, complete copy.
First edition, published by subscription in May, 1779. This is a copy of the first issue with no attempt at correction on p.95: i.e., "Ein reichre Mann" (line 11) is followed by "Der reichre Jude war (line 13). A towering figure of the eighteenth-century German Enlightenment, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781) produced two works, one at the beginning of his literary career, and one at the end, each of which featured a Jew as a principal character. The one-act comedy Die Juden (1749) was one of Lessing's earliest literary ventures and was "the first time a Jew was presented on a the German stage in a reasonably objective manner" (EJ). His last play, Nathan the Wise (1779), is much better known, and once again contains a plea for toleration. Lessing's inspiration for Nathan was his friend, the Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. Nathan is here made the spokesperson for brotherhood, tolerance, and the love of humanity, indeed all the noble aspirations of the Enlightenment. The play is set during the time of the Third Crusade (ca. 1192), during an armistace in Jerusalem. "Based on the parable of the three rings, adapted from Boccaccio's Decameron, the play presents Judaism (represented by Nathan), Christianity (a Templar knight), and Islam (Saladin, the Turkish Sultan) as three sons of a benevolent father who has given each an identical ring, although each one claims that his ring alone is authentic" (EJ). While the vision here presented of inter-religious amity was ridiculed by the likes of Julius von Voss (Der travestierte Nathan der Weise, 1804), and attacked by various anti-Semites, Lessing's ideals found much support among German Jews such as Gabriel Riesser, I. H. Ritter, Berthold Auerback, Emil Lehmann, and Johann Jacoby. Indeed, Lessing's "ideological and stylistic influence on the Haskalah was as decisive as that of Friedrich Schiller" (EJ).
"Lessing was born in Saxony, the son of a pastor, and after a brilliant career at school entered the University of Leipzig as a theology student. Here, however, the two interests, literature and the theatre, which were to dominate his life, first discovered themselves... Yet perhaps Lessing is best judged by the sum of his achievement. He was one of the principal figures in the Aufklärung, the emancipation of German literature from the narrow classicism of the French school. It was he, more than any other, who laid the foundation of the intellectual primacy of German writers and thinkers in the nineteenth century... Without attching himself to any special philosophical school, he consistently opposed error and dogmatism, and in art, in poetry, in drama and in religion he provided new stimulation..." (PMM, pp. 128-129). Good. Item #53771
References: J. Carter & P. H. Muir (eds.), Printing and the Mind of Man, pp.128-129. K. Lachmann, Gotthold Ephraim Lessings sämtliche Schriften, 1919, vol. 22, part 2, pp. 458-459: this ed. noted as "subskriptionsausg. Mai 1779"). VD18 11831499.
Price: $2,250.00