Sehr gutes Exemplar; nahezu neuwertig. - Englisch. - John Deathridge presents a critical view of Richard Wagner based on recent research that does not shy away from some unpalatable truths about this most controversial of composers in the canon of Western music. Deathridge writes authoritatively about what Wagner did, said, and wrote, drawing from abundant material already well known but also from less familiar sources, including hitherto seldom discussed letters and diaries and previously unpublished musical sketches. At the same time, Deathridge suggests that a true estimation of Wagner does not lie in an all too easy condemnation of his many provocative actions and ideas. Rather, it is to be found in the questions about the modern world and our place in it posed by the best of his stage works, among them Tristan und Isolde and Der Ring des Nibelungen. The controversy over Wagner's life and work is unlikely to end, but rather than taking the course of least resistance by regarding him blandly as a "classic" in the Western art tradition, Deathridge engages the debates that have raged about him and moves beyond them, toward a fresh and engaging assessment of what Wagner ultimately achieved. (Verlagstext) // INHALT : Preface ----- PART I. A FEW BEGINNINGS ----- Wagner Lives ----- Issues in Autobiography ----- "Pale" Senta ----- Female Sacrifice and the Desire for Heimat ----- Wagner the Progressive Another Look at Lohengrin ----- PART II. DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN ----- Fairy Tale, Revolution, Prophecy Preliminary Evening: Das Rheingold ----- Symphonic Mastery or Moral Anarchy? First Day: Die Walküre ----- Siegfried Hero Second Day: Siegfried ----- Finishing the End ----- Third Day: Gotterdämmerung ----- PART III. THE ELUSIVENESS OF TRAGEDY ----- Don Carlos and Gotterdämmerung ----- Two Operatic Endings and Walter Benjamin's Trauerspiel ----- Wagner's Greeks, and Wieland's Too ----- PART IV. TRISTAN UND ISOLDE ----- Dangerous Fascinations ----- Public and Private Life ----- Reflections on the Genesis of Tristan and Isolde and the Wesendonck Lieder ----- Postmortem on Isolde ----- PART V. MATURE POLEMICS ----- Strange Love, Or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Parsifal ----- Mendelssohn and the Strange Case of the (Lost) Symphony in C ----- Unfinished Symphonies ----- PART VI. OPERATIC FUTURES ----- Configurations of the New ----- Wagner and Beyond ----- List of Abbreviations ----- Notes ----- Acknowledgments ----- Index. ISBN 9780520254534
