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Cited by 4 publications
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Many Victorian commentators, from Herbert Spencer and Charles Darwin on, saw music as the most primitive of all the arts, an inarticulate precursor of language, and yet many Victorians, particularly towards the end of the century, also saw music as the purest of all art forms. The tremendous tension between these two views meant that music provided, and provides, an ideal way to understand more completely Victorian ideas about evolution, gender, and race in relation to aesthetics, although scholarship on music has only begun to consider those relationships. But as Vernon Lee long ago pointed out, in a series of thoughtful essays about music published in Fraser's Magazine and other periodicals in the 1870s and 1880s, music has always been slower to develop than other arts or fields of study. This is in fact why musicologists speak of “nineteenth-century music,” rather than Victorian music: the Romantic period in music, for example, is starting as the Romantic period in literature had largely ended; the English Musical Renaissance comes after the renaissance period in British literature; and so on. Musicology, likewise, is a comparatively young field, and the study of nineteenth-century British music – long limited to Gilbert and Sullivan, if considered at all – younger yet. Studies of literature that engage with music as an important part of the historical context of a given text depend on developments in musicology for a proper understanding of that context, which is why such works are comparatively few. Why music should be slower to develop than other fields is a question outside the scope of this essay, but the good news is that in the past ten years a number of useful and valuable works of scholarship on nineteenth-century British music have appeared, examining not only neglected composers and musical works, but also performers, concert organizers, music publishers, instruments and their history, and evolutionary, Orientalist, and nationalist discourses about music. This scholarship, valuable in itself, not only expands our knowledge of musicology and cultural history; by pointing out some of the deep connections between literature and music in the Victorian period, such scholarship also suggests new ways to think about literary forms, canon formation, and aesthetic theories.
Many Victorian commentators, from Herbert Spencer and Charles Darwin on, saw music as the most primitive of all the arts, an inarticulate precursor of language, and yet many Victorians, particularly towards the end of the century, also saw music as the purest of all art forms. The tremendous tension between these two views meant that music provided, and provides, an ideal way to understand more completely Victorian ideas about evolution, gender, and race in relation to aesthetics, although scholarship on music has only begun to consider those relationships. But as Vernon Lee long ago pointed out, in a series of thoughtful essays about music published in Fraser's Magazine and other periodicals in the 1870s and 1880s, music has always been slower to develop than other arts or fields of study. This is in fact why musicologists speak of “nineteenth-century music,” rather than Victorian music: the Romantic period in music, for example, is starting as the Romantic period in literature had largely ended; the English Musical Renaissance comes after the renaissance period in British literature; and so on. Musicology, likewise, is a comparatively young field, and the study of nineteenth-century British music – long limited to Gilbert and Sullivan, if considered at all – younger yet. Studies of literature that engage with music as an important part of the historical context of a given text depend on developments in musicology for a proper understanding of that context, which is why such works are comparatively few. Why music should be slower to develop than other fields is a question outside the scope of this essay, but the good news is that in the past ten years a number of useful and valuable works of scholarship on nineteenth-century British music have appeared, examining not only neglected composers and musical works, but also performers, concert organizers, music publishers, instruments and their history, and evolutionary, Orientalist, and nationalist discourses about music. This scholarship, valuable in itself, not only expands our knowledge of musicology and cultural history; by pointing out some of the deep connections between literature and music in the Victorian period, such scholarship also suggests new ways to think about literary forms, canon formation, and aesthetic theories.
Over the last 20 years, the impact of critical musicology (or new musicology) has given rise to fresh areas of exploration (e.g., performance practices, reception histories, affect, listening) and new methods and sites of investigation, including Victorian novels and poems. Influenced by cultural criticism, critical musicologists study musical practices as interactive with a wide range of human activities and beliefs. Simultaneously, literary scholars and historians have played a prominent early role in promoting the study of music in 19th-century Britain and in establishing its aims and methods. To these researchers and to contextually minded musicologists, it was obvious that music embodied and expressed ideological and political meanings, and that fictional, non-fictional, and verse works elucidated and helped to construct these perceptions. Music and Victorian literature is thus a truly interdisciplinary field because it speaks to individuals whose home training is in either literature or music, while also influencing scholars in a range of other disciplines including social and cultural history, art history, women's studies, gender studies, and queer studies.Introducing the field of music and Victorian literature to a literary audience therefore means first tracing developments in the discipline of music and then highlighting a major disciplinary difference (composer intentionality versus the death of the author). Outlining the latter will, I hope, suggest opportunities for critical musicologists as well as for people interested specifically in word-music connections. In particular, the issue of subjectivity is ripe for further development as can be seen by work on 19th-century poetry and music that is a part of new lyric studies. The final sections of the article outline the latter, indicate the interdisciplinary beginnings of the study of music in 19th-century Britain, provide a list of resources, and map out other recent trends and possible future directions in scholarship on music and Victorian literature.Throughout the whole of the first act we remained in our position -the Count, absorbed by the orchestra and the stage, never casting so much as a chance glance at us. Not a note of Donizetti's delicious music was lost on him.[…] When the people near him applauded the close of an air (as an English audience in such circumstances always will applaud), without the least consideration for the orchestral movement which immediately followed it, he looked round at them with an expression of compassionate remonstrance, and held up one hand with a gesture of polite entreaty. At the more refined passages of the singing, at the more delicate phases [sic] of the music, which passes unapplauded by others, his fat hands, […] softly patted each other, in token of the cultivated appreciation of a musical man. At such times, his oily murmur of approval, ''Bravo! Bra-a-a-a!'' hummed through the silence, like the purring of a great cat. His immediate neighbours on either side -hearty, ruddy-faced people from the country, ...
This article will introduce readers to current debates in the philosophy of poetry. This includes discussion of the need for a philosophy of poetry as distinct from a philosophy of literature, the (in)compatibility of poetry and philosophy, poetic meaning and interpretation, and poetry in relation to affect, emotion and expressiveness, which opens up discussion of wider forms of poetry from spoken word to signlanguage poetry. The article ends with suggestions for future directions of research in the philosophy of poetry. I argue that as the philosophy of poetry is gaining interest, the previous debates that presuppose an understanding of poetry as taking form on the page and as having fixed aboutness ought to be abandoned in favour of an understanding of a poem in the affective space, with issues of reception, interpretation, distribution, and performance in play.
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