The Origin of German Baroque Drama

Walter Benjamin's book "The Origin of German Baroque Drama" (1928) — a dissertation of the author not accepted by the scientific community at the time and at the same time one of the most important aesthetic and philosophical works of the past century. Here, Benjamin's creative peculiarity, which Hannah Arendt called "poetic thinking", is fully revealed. The complex of phenomena considered by Benjamin is much broader than what is stated in the title. He is concerned not with the letter of 17th-century German drama, but with its spirit. Baroque, in the analysis of the German philosopher, suddenly turns out not to be "relevant" as a mirror of modernity, but one of the possible answers — remarkably sober and profound — to the questions that arose before a person who experienced and continues to experience the tragic events of the 20th century.