The meaning of the final scene in Friedrich Schillers drama ‘The maid of Orleans’

The article deals with the final scene of the historical drama The Maid of Orleans by the German poet Friedrich Schiller. It is discussed in the context of the principle of subjectivity, which is one of the main principles for modernity as a macro era, as well as through the prism of a special understanding of history by the creators of art of the second half of the 18th - early 19th centuries. The article aims to: analyze the final scene of the drama from the point of view of F. Schiller’s philosophical ideas reflected in his philosophical treatises and articles on history and poetically embodied in the Ode to Joy; identify the peculiar features of the image of the main character of the play, associated with the creative principles of the modern era and the subjective understanding of the historical personality by the playwright. The study revealed that of particular importance for F. Schiller’s works, both philosophical and dramatic, were Johann Herder’s reflections on unity and the concept of pre-established harmony proposed by Gottfried Leibniz. It was found that the poet’s conscious retreat from historical reality when creating the final scene of the work was connected, on the one hand, with the specific representation of Joan of Arc as a person capable of recreating reality in a special way; on the other hand, with the individual-author’s awareness of the interrelationship of historical epochs, characteristic of the time of modernity, which made it possible for the poet to most clearly convey through dramatic action the idea of total unity, philosophically interpreted by him on the pages of treatises, which turns out to be especially significant for the early 19th century.