{"product_id":"the-total-work-of-art-in-european-modernism-9780801450235","title":"The Total Work of Art in European Modernism","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn this groundbreaking book David Roberts sets out to demonstrate the centrality of the total work of art to European modernism since the French Revolution. The total work of art is usually understood as the intention to reunite the arts into the one integrated whole, but it is also tied from the beginning to the desire to recover and renew the public function of art. The synthesis of the arts in the service of social and cultural regeneration was a particularly German dream, which made Wagner and Nietzsche the other center of aesthetic modernism alongside Baudelaire and Mallarmé. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe history and theory of the total work of art pose a whole series of questions not only to aesthetic modernism and its utopias but also to the whole epoch from the French Revolution to the totalitarian revolutions of the twentieth century. The total work of art indicates the need to revisit key assumptions of modernism, such as the foregrounding of the autonomy and separation of the arts at the ex\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRoberts portrays the total work of art not simply as a particular and peripheral genre of modern culture but rather as a fundamental idea that responded to the experience of desacralization in modernity... This book is impressive in sweep, thought-provoking in its challenges to accepted cultural schemas, and fascinating in the details it uncovers along the way. In short: a grand synthetic account that truly holds together. It represents an important contribution to the re-thinking of modernism.\u003c\/p\u003e * Monatshefte *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eThere is much to admire in Roberts' study of the total work of art and he convincingly makes the case for its importance.... Roberts’ book provides a hugely insightful study of the total work of art. Most helpfully he uses this recurring motif as a way of breaking down conventional narratives about modernist politics, spirituality and aesthetic technique.\u003c\/p\u003e * Consciousness, Spirituality and the Arts *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eWith this volume, Roberts completes a trilogy devoted to European modernism. \u003ci\u003eArt and Enlightenment\u003c\/i\u003e (1991) offered a critical assessment of Adorno's theory of modern music, while \u003ci\u003eDialectic of Romanticism\u003c\/i\u003e proposed a 'civil' alternative to Romantic nostalgia and Enlightenment progressivism. This new book, on the tangled legacy of Richard Wagner's \u003ci\u003eGesamtkunstwerk\u003c\/i\u003e ('total work of art'), is equally original, in approach and detailed readings.... The author traces its origins to the French Revolution and German Romanticism, and then monitors the cultural resonance of Wagner's \u003ci\u003eParsifal\u003c\/i\u003e, via Nietzsche and Mallarmé, which extends to the 20th-century avant-garde—particularly its odd mix of differentiation\/synthesis of the arts, and its theatrical fusion of art and life. Finally he surveys the 'sublime' politics of Fascist spectacle, which Walter Benjamin famously reduced to the 'aestheticization of politics.' If the Nazis seem finally to have discredited the entire tradition, it nevertheless finds a spectral afterlife in contemporary theme parks and cyberspace. Ambitious, densely written, yet rewarding, this volume caps a remarkable achievement. Summing Up: Highly recommended.\u003c\/p\u003e * Choice *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eRobert's comprehensive account is impressive, and the breadth of his references is matched by the pertinence and precision of his case studies from across European literature, art, architecture, music, and film...\u003c\/p\u003e * Modern Language Review *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction\u003cb\u003ePart I: The Artwork of the Future\u003c\/b\u003e1. Refounding Society\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eAncients and Moderns: Rousseau's Civil Religion\u003cbr\u003e The Festivals of the French Revolution\u003cbr\u003e Revolution and Representation\u003cbr\u003e The Abyss of Political Foundation\u003c\/i\u003e2. The Destination of Art\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Secularization of Art: Quatremère de Quincy\u003cbr\u003e Aesthetic Education: Schiller\u003cbr\u003e Aesthetic Revolution: Hölderlin\u003cbr\u003e The Destiny of Art: Hegel\u003c\/i\u003e3. Prophets and Precursors: Paris 1830–1848\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eOrganic and Critical Epochs: Saint-Simon\u003cbr\u003e Musical Palingenesis: Mazzini and Balzac\u003cbr\u003e The Musical City: Berlioz\u003cbr\u003e Ancients and Moderns: Wagner\u003c\/i\u003e4. Staging the Absolute\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eModernism or the Long Nineteenth Century\u003cbr\u003e The Birth of Tragedy: Nietzsche\u003cbr\u003e The Great Work: Mallarmé\u003cbr\u003e Dialectic of Enlightenment: From the Nineteenth to the Twentieth Century\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003ePart II: The Spiritual in Art\u003c\/b\u003e5. Religion and Art: Parsifal as Paradigm\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Idea of Return\u003cbr\u003e Religion and Art\u003cbr\u003e The Profoundest Symbol: The Grail\u003cbr\u003e The Theater to Come\u003c\/i\u003e6. The Symbolist Mystery\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eHomage to the Gesamtkunstwerk\u003cbr\u003e The Ultimate Fiction: Mallarmé's Book\u003cbr\u003e The Last Ecstasy: Scriabin's Mysterium\u003cbr\u003e Gnosis and Ecstasy\u003c\/i\u003e7. Gesamtkunstwerk and Avant-Garde\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Avant-Garde: Analysis and Synthesis\u003cbr\u003e From Dionysus to Apollo: Stravinsky and the Ballets Russes\u003cbr\u003e The Spiritual in Art: Kandinsky and the Blaue Reiter\u003cbr\u003e The Crystal Cathedral: Bruno Taut and the Bauhaus\u003c\/i\u003e8. The Promised Land: Toward a Retotalized Theatre\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Theatre Reform Movement\u003cbr\u003e World Theatre: Hofmannsthal and Claudel\u003cbr\u003e Theatre of Cruelty: Brecht and Artaud\u003cbr\u003e Synthesis of the Arts: A Typology\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003ePart III: The Sublime in Politics\u003c\/b\u003e9. National Regeneration\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Community to Come\u003cbr\u003e Romain Rolland: Le théâtre du peuple\u003cbr\u003e Gabriele d’Annunzio: Il fuoco\u003cbr\u003e The Nietzschean Sublime\u003c\/i\u003e10. Art and Revolution: The Soviet Union\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Birth of the New Man\u003cbr\u003e Festivals of the Revolution\u003cbr\u003e From Art to Life: The Russian Avant-Garde\u003cbr\u003e Stalin’s Total Work of Art\u003c\/i\u003e11. The Will to Power as Art: The Third Reich\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Avant-Garde and the Breakthrough to Totality\u003cbr\u003e Benjamin and the Aestheticization of Politics\u003cbr\u003e The State as Work of Art: Jünger’s Der Arbeiter\u003cbr\u003e Hitler’s Triumph of the Will\u003c\/i\u003eConclusion\u003cbr\u003e Bibliography\u003cbr\u003e Index\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Cornell University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49405136044375,"sku":"9780801450235","price":35.15,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780801450235.jpg?v=1730488836","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/the-total-work-of-art-in-european-modernism-9780801450235","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}