Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock (1724-1803) is one of the most important figures in the history of German literature. He is seen as paving the way for the age of sentimentalism, Sturm und Drang, and the literature of experience. Klopstock was an ingenious linguistic innovator, and he established a body of work of lasting significance with his epic "The Messiah," and with his odes, dramas and poetic writings. With his wide network of connections with Enlightenment poets and thinkers, he was a focus of the intellectual world of his age.

The Hamburg Klopstock Edition is the first complete...