Through Beauty to Freedom

Classical Weimar began in the early 1770s, when an oppressive feeling that Germany was stuck in a standstill was spreading throughout the land, creating an urgent need for new impulses. Against the backdrop of these dramatic historical events, Georg Schmidt portrays everyday life in the twin cities, allowing readers to understand their actors' motives and networks, and shows what kept this world together. He paints a picture of a city of burghers, muses, and geniuses, where, in the shadow of revolution, terror, war, and the manifold upheavals of modernity, the outlines of an underappreciated and repressed alternative took shape, intended to prepare man for freedom through aesthetic education.