Sturm und Drang

Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress), name given to one aspect of 18th-century German Romanticism which carried to excess the doctrine of the rights of man and Rousseau's plea for a return to nature. It took its name from the title of a play by Klinger, produced in 1776, and was much influenced by Shakespeare. Among the frequently recurring themes in the plays which characterize the movement are the tragedy of the unmarried mother executed for infanticide while her seducer goes free, treated by Goethe and Klinger; the conflict between hostile brothers in love with the same woman, as in Julius von Tarent (1776) by Leisewitz and Schiller's Die Räuber (1782); and the overmastering power of love, hurling even honourable natures into crime, as in Golo und Genoveva (c.1780) by ‘Maler’ Müller. The movement had repercussions all over Europe, and its influence can clearly be seen in early 19th-century English melodrama. A native German offshoot of it was the Ritterdrama.