Beethoven Essays - Softcover

Solomon, Maynard

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0674063791 ISBN 13: 9780674063792

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 1990

Synopsis

Maynard Solomon is the author of a classic biography of Beethoven which has become a standard work throughout the world, having been translated into seven languages. In Beethoven Essays, he continues his exploration of Beethoven's inner life, visionary outlook, and creativity, in a series of profound studies of this colossal figure of our civilization.

Solomon deftly fuses a variety of investigative approaches, from rigorous historical and ideological studies to imaginative musical and psychoanalytic speculations. Thus, after closely documenting Beethoven's birth and illegitimacy fantasies, his “Family Romance,” and his pretense of nobility, Solomon offers extraordinary interpretations of the composer's dreams, deafness, and obsessive relationship to his nephew. And, following his detailed uncovering of a complex network of recurrent patterns in the Ninth Symphony, he considers the narrative and mythic implications of Beethoven's formal design.

Solomon examines the broad patterns of Beethoven's creative evolution and processes of composition, the radical modernism of his music, and his intellectual, religious, and utopian strivings. A separate section on the “Immortal Beloved” includes the fullest biography of Antonia Brentano yet published. Closing the volume is Solomon's translation and annotated edition of Beethoven's Tagebuch, the moving, intimate diary that the composer kept during the critical period that culminated in his last style. Here, as throughout Beethoven Essays, Solomon offers scholarship that is at the cutting edge of Beethoven research.

In addition to his numerous writings on Beethoven, Maynard Solomon has written on Shubert, Mozart, and Ives. He works extensively in applied psychoanalysis and has also edited a standard work on Marxist aesthetics.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

This book contains virtually all of my important Beethoven essays, most of which were written during the past ten years. Primarily, these are depth studies of psychological, historical, and creative issues whose implications cannot be fully explored within the confines of a narrative biography.

About the Author:

In addition to his numerous writings on Beethoven, Maynard Solomon has written on Schubert, Mozart, and Ives. He works extensively in applied psychoanalysis and has also edited a standard work on Marxist aesthetics.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 1990
• ISBN 10: 0674063791
• ISBN 13: 9780674063792
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384