Description
Book SynopsisThe Beethoven Syndrome: Hearing Music as Autobiography traces the rise, fall, and persistence of a radical new mode of listening from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present.
Trade ReviewA tour de force of scholarship and argumentation. Reconstructing the changing discourses surrounding music in different decades of European history, Bonds boldly challenges commonly held beliefs about composers "expressing themselves" in music. * James Hepokoski, Henry L. and Lucy G. Moses Professor of Music, Yale University *
It is now common to link the tumults of Beethoven's life and the struggles that we hear in his music. In this revelatory book, Bonds draws on an astonishing range of writers to explain how this happened, and how it has affected listeners and composer ever since. * Christopher Reynolds, Distinguished Professor of Music, Emeritus, UC Davis *
Table of ContentsIntroduction: The Instrumental Self Part 1: The Paradigm of Objective Expression: 1770-1830 Chapter 1: The Framework of Rhetoric Chapter 2: Toward Subjective Expression Chapter 3: The Composer in the Work Part 2: The Paradigm of Subjective Expression: 1830-1920 Chapter 4: The Framework of Hermeneutics Chapter 5: First-Person Beethoven Chapter 6: After Beethoven Part 3: Dual Paradigms: Since 1920 Chapter 7: The Return of Objectivity Chapter 8: The Endurance of Subjectivity Conclusion: Tracking Comets Bibliography
