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Affecting Grace: Theatre, Subject, and the Shakespearean Paradox in German Literature from Lessing to Kleist

Affecting Grace: Theatre, Subject, and the Shakespearean Paradox in German Literature from... 68:4 © 2016 by University of Oregon BOOK REVIEWS / 451 dramatic work" (7). One of the great merits of the book is that it brings to light the hitherto covert significance of The Merchant of Venice not only for German theater -- Shylock "prefigures" Lessing's Nathan (76), who is "a devilified Shylock" (34) -- but also more broadly for German thought. (The observations on Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals are especially relevant and enlightening.) Calhoon is right that such significance "far supersedes anything that could be brought under the headings of `influence' or `reception'" (21), and Affecting Grace cannot be reduced to a history of either; instead, it weaves "the fabric of a broad epochal suggestion" (23) in painstaking detail and uncompromising thoroughness. Calhoon's study is itself a virtuoso display of affecting grace: with the fearlessness and nonchalance of a tightrope walker, Calhoon ventures above the most perilous conceptual abysses, and even as the reader may often be afraid that he will lose his balance, he always makes it safely to the other side, and with an apparent lack of effort. At the same time, and this is one of the few criticisms we may level at what http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Comparative Literature Duke University Press

Affecting Grace: Theatre, Subject, and the Shakespearean Paradox in German Literature from Lessing to Kleist

Comparative Literature , Volume 68 (4) – Dec 1, 2016

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Publisher
Duke University Press
Copyright
Copyright © Duke Univ Press
ISSN
0010-4124
eISSN
1945-8517
DOI
10.1215/00104124-3698507
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

68:4 © 2016 by University of Oregon BOOK REVIEWS / 451 dramatic work" (7). One of the great merits of the book is that it brings to light the hitherto covert significance of The Merchant of Venice not only for German theater -- Shylock "prefigures" Lessing's Nathan (76), who is "a devilified Shylock" (34) -- but also more broadly for German thought. (The observations on Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals are especially relevant and enlightening.) Calhoon is right that such significance "far supersedes anything that could be brought under the headings of `influence' or `reception'" (21), and Affecting Grace cannot be reduced to a history of either; instead, it weaves "the fabric of a broad epochal suggestion" (23) in painstaking detail and uncompromising thoroughness. Calhoon's study is itself a virtuoso display of affecting grace: with the fearlessness and nonchalance of a tightrope walker, Calhoon ventures above the most perilous conceptual abysses, and even as the reader may often be afraid that he will lose his balance, he always makes it safely to the other side, and with an apparent lack of effort. At the same time, and this is one of the few criticisms we may level at what

Journal

Comparative LiteratureDuke University Press

Published: Dec 1, 2016

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