a German philosopher, author, and critic. For about thirty years, he exercised an almost undisputed literary dictatorship in Germany. But by his later years, his name had become a by-word for foolish pedantry. Gottsched's chief work was his Versuch einer kritischen Dichtkunst für die Deutschen (1730), the first systematic treatise in German on the art of poetry from the standpoint of Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux. His Ausführliche Redekunst (1728) and his Grundlegung einer deutschen Sprachkunst (1748) were of importance for the development of German style and the purification of the language. He wrote several plays which were long popular on the stage.
