Rethinking Hanslick: Music, Formalism, and Expression

Rethinking Hanslick: Music, Formalism, and Expression is the first extensive English-language study devoted to Eduard Hanslick--a seminal figure in nineteenth-century musical life. Bringing together eminent scholars from several disciplines, this volume examines Hanslick's contribution to the aesthetics and philosophy of music and looks anew at his literary interests. The essays embrace ways of thinking about Hanslick's writings that go beyond the polarities that have long marked discussion of his work such as form/expression, absolute/program music, objectivity/subjectivity, and formalist/hermeneutic criticism. This approach takes into consideration both Hanslick's important On the Musically Beautiful and his critical and autobiographical writings, demonstrating Hanslick's rich insights into the context in which a musical work is composed, performed, and received. Rethinking Hanslick serves as an invaluable companion to Hanslick's prodigious scholarship and criticism, deepening our understanding of the major themes and ideas of one of the most influential music critics of the nineteenth century. Contributors: David Brodbeck, James Deaville, Chantal Frankenbach, Lauren Freede, Marion Gerards, Dana Gooley, Nicole Grimes, David Kasunic, David Larkin, Fred Everett Maus, Timothy R. McKinney, Nina Noeske, Anthony Pryer, Felix Wörner Nicole Grimes is Marie Curie Fellow at University College Dublin (UCD) and the University of California, Irvine. Siobhán Donovan is a college lecturer at the School of Languages and Literatures, UCD. Wolfgang Marx is a senior lecturer at the School of Music, UCD.

Table of Contents

IntroductionNegotiating the "Absolute": Hanslick's Path through Musical HistoryHanslick's ComposersHanslick, Legal Processes, and Scientific Methodologies: How Not to Construct an Ontology of MusicOtakar Hostinský, the Musically Beautiful, and the GesamtkunstwerkHanslick on Johann Strauss Jr.: Genre, Social Class, and Liberalism in ViennaWaltzing around the Musically Beautiful: Listening and Dancing in Hanslick's Hierarchy of Musical Perception"Poison-Flaming Flowers from the Orient and Nightingales from Bayreuth": On Hanslick's Reception of the Music of GoldmarkGerman Humanism, Liberalism, and Elegy in Hanslick's Writings on BrahmsThe Critic as Subject: Hanslick's Aus meinem Leben as a Reflection on Culture and Identity"Faust und Hamlet in Einer Person": The Musical Writings of Eduard Hanslick as Part of the Gender Discourse in the Late Nineteenth CenturyBody and Soul, Content and Form: On Hanslick's Use of the Organism MetaphorHanslick and Hugo WolfBattle Rejoined: Hanslick and the Symphonic Poem in the 1890sOn "Jewishness" and Genre: Hanslick's Reception of Gustav MahlerSelected BibliographyList of ContributorsIndex