Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Music Examples
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
- CHAPTER 1 Schubert the Singer
- CHAPTER 2 The Sea of Eternity
- CHAPTER 3 The River of Time
- CHAPTER 4 The Shape of the Moon
- CHAPTER 5 The Aesthetics of Genre
- CHAPTER 6 Recyling the Harper
- CHAPTER 7 Recycling Mignon
- CHAPTER 8 One Song to the Tune of Another
- Conclusion
- APPENDIX List of Schubert's Multiple Settings of Goethe
- Works Cited
- Index
CHAPTER 5 - The Aesthetics of Genre
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Music Examples
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
- CHAPTER 1 Schubert the Singer
- CHAPTER 2 The Sea of Eternity
- CHAPTER 3 The River of Time
- CHAPTER 4 The Shape of the Moon
- CHAPTER 5 The Aesthetics of Genre
- CHAPTER 6 Recyling the Harper
- CHAPTER 7 Recycling Mignon
- CHAPTER 8 One Song to the Tune of Another
- Conclusion
- APPENDIX List of Schubert's Multiple Settings of Goethe
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
Diese Gondel vergleich ich der sanft einschaukelnden Wiege,
Und das Kästchen darauf scheint ein geräumiger Sarg.
Recht so! Zwischen der Wieg und dem Sarg wir schwanken und schweben
Auf dem groβen Kanal sorglos durchs Leben dahin.
This gondola I compare to the gently rocking cradle,
And the little box above it seems like a spacious coffin.
Just so! Between the cradle and the coffin we rock and float
Along the Grand Canal, through life.
(Goethe: Venetian Epigram no. 8)Goethe'S epigram neatly encapsulates the Romantic fascination with a city whose beauty and mystery was surely due in large measure to that curious artificial watercourse known as the canal. Chapters 2 and 3 explored some of the ways in which water, in either its static or flowing state, served as a metaphor for the absence or motion of time – not only for Goethe, but for Schubert and many others of their era. The canal, however, resists such binary categorization, containing properties of both river and sea. As an essentially one-dimensional line rather than a limitless expanse, it shares a fundamental similarity to the former, yet its lack of directional flow allies it to the latter. As such, it must have been a particularly compelling and provocative symbol of the eternal conundrums of human existence, and Goethe's evocation of the gondola as both cradle and coffin is symptomatic of this paradox.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Re-Reading PoetrySchubert's Multiple Settings of Goethe, pp. 113 - 158Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2009