Virginia Woolf and Classical Music: Politics, Aesthetics, Form

Emma Sutton

Published by Edinburgh University Press 2013

Virginia Woolf and Classical Music

Politics, Aesthetics, Form

Emma Sutton

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780748637881

Overview
Contents

About this book

This study is a groundbreaking investigation into the formative influence of music on Virginia Woolf’s writing

In this unique study Emma Sutton discusses all of Woolf’s novels as well as selected essays and short fiction, offering detailed commentaries on Woolf’s numerous allusions to classical repertoire and to composers including Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Wagner. Sutton explores Woolf’s interest in the contested relationship between politics and music, placing her work in a matrix of ideas about music and national identity, class, anti-Semitism, pacifism, sexuality and gender. The study also considers the formal influence of music – from fugue to Romantic opera – on Woolf’s prose and narrative techniques. The analysis of music’s role in Woolf’s aesthetics and fiction is contextualized in accounts of her musical education, activities as a listener, and friendships with musicians; and the study outlines the relationship between her ‘musicalized’ work and that of contemporaries including Joyce, Lawrence, Forster, Mansfield and Eliot.

Key Features:

Analysis of music, national identity and war in The Voyage Out, Jacob’s Room and Mrs Dalloway
Close reading of Wagner’s influence on the plot and narrative techniques of The Voyage Out
Analysis of music and philo- and anti-Semitism in The Years
Innovative reading of the ‘fugal’ structure of Mrs Dalloway

Listen to an interview with Emma Sutton on ABC's RN here

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Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgements Publicly Available Download PDF	vi
List of Abbreviations and Editions Used in the Text Publicly Available Download PDF	viii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Chapter 1 On Not Writing Opera Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	25
Chapter 2 Killing the Pianist in the House Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	48
Chapter 3 Death in Effigy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	69
Chapter 4 Fugues, Flights and Free Association Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	90
Chapter 5 What It Really Means to be English Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	113
Chapter 6 Only Suggest Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	137
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	154
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	166

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Audience: College/higher education;
Pages
- Main content: 184
Keywords: Literary Studies

eBook

Published: September 16, 2013
ISBN: 9780748637881