Wagner in Context

Approachable, concise chapters from a wide range of perspectives illuminate this complex figure along with his contemporary and current contexts.

David Trippett (Edited by)

9781108836463, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 14 March 2024

484 pages
23.5 x 15.9 x 3.1 cm, 0.85 kg

'Wagner in Context is successful in providing concise summaries of well-established topics in Wagner studies while at the same time making space for new discourses, methodologies, and contexts in which his life, work, and significance may be (re)assessed … The breadth and overall accessibility of the volume may help to create new interdisciplinary connections and networks.' Jeremy Coleman, Music and Letters

Few composers embodied wider cultural interests than Wagner or had greater cultural consequences. This is the first collection to examine directly the rich array of intellectual, social and cultural contexts within which Wagner worked. Alongside fresh accounts of historical topics, from spa culture to racial theory, sentient bodies to stage technology, America to Spain, it casts an eye forward to contexts of Wagner's ongoing reception, from video gaming to sound recording, Israel to Friedrich Kittler, and twenty-first century warfare. The collection brings together an international cast of leading authorities and new voices. Its 42 short chapters offer a reader-friendly way into Wagner studies, with authoritative studies of central topics set alongside emerging new fields. It sheds new light on previously neglected individuals such as Minna Wagner, Theodor Herzl and Houston Stewart Chamberlain, and investigates the global circulation of Wagner's works, his approach to money, and the controversies that continue to accompany him.

Part I. Place: 1. Paris Katharine Ellis
2. Dresden Thomas S. Grey
3. Zurich and Lucerne Chris Walton
4. Italy Ellen Lockhart
5. London Barry Millington
6. Bayreuth as city: a wagnerian chronology Sven Friedrich
7. America Leon Botstein
8. Spain in the cosmos of Richard Wagner Dieter Borchmeyer
Part II. People: 9. Franz Liszt Joanne Cormac
10. Nietzsche and Wagner: the logic of contradiction Federico Celestini
11. Wagner, schopenhauer and the world as a phantasmagoria Robert Wicks
12. Assessing wilhelmine schröder-devrient: influence, genre, and voice Anno Mungen
13. Cosima wagner Eva Rieger
14. The wagner family: rebellion, honour, aftermath John Deathridge
Part III. Politics, Ideas & Bodies: 15. National politics Tim Blanning
16. Revolutionary politics Mark Berry
17. World drama. Wagner's hegelian heritage Günter Zöller
18. Towards an 'ideal' feminine Eva Rieger
19. Health & wellness Holly Watkins
20. Sexuality & social mores Barry Millington
21. Sentient bodies David Trippett
22. Racial theory George Williamson
Part IV. Life, Language & the Ancient World: 23. Wagner's finances Sven Friedrich
24. Wagner's apprenticeship Anna Stoll Knecht
25. Wagner's mendacious humanism: wagnerian rhetoric between nature and the human Kirsten Paige
26. Declaiming wagner: between genesis and historical performance practice Martin Knust
27. The german study of india and buddhism Douglas McGetchin
28. Greek drama in its nineteenth-century reception Michael Ewans
Part V. Music & Performance: 29. Orchestration Edward Reeve
30. Wagner and music analysis: Siegfried and the rhinemaidens Patrick McCreless
31. The scene of grand opera Barbara Eichner
32. Wagner on the move Charlotte Bentley
33. Stage technology Gundula Kreuzer
34. Historic staging (1876-1976) Patrick Carnegy
Part VI. Reception: 35. Regietheater in performance Clemens Risi
36. Twentieth-century reception and anti-semitisim Pamela Potter
37. Bayreuth as idea: chamberlain, wolzogen, hitler Udo Bermbach
38. Performing wagner in israel: an affront or a tribute? Victor Nefkens
39. Nineteenth-century music criticism Alexander Wilfing
40. Wotan's stormtroopers and the total art machine: kittler's ring of the nibelung Geoffrey Winthrop-Young
41. Sound recording Laura Tunbridge
42. The wagnerian erotics of video game music Tim Summers
Further reading
Select bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Classical music [c 1750 to c 1830 AVGC4]