Named for a play by Friedrich Maximilian Klinger about the American Revolution of 1776, this was the prevalent German literary movement of the late 18th/ early 19th century, and a counterpoint to other movements which, like French neo-classicism, primarily saw human action as determined by objective, rational motives and thought processes: The hero(ine) of a "Sturm und Drang" novel, play or poem is typically tormented by emotions, and sees the world only from their own, entirely subjective point of view, which, however much it may come to be their undoing in the end, is an attitude not only validated but even valued much higher than that expressed by rational, calculated action in these works.