Arnold Schoenberg: The Composer as Jew

Ringer, Alexander L.

ISBN 10: 0193154668 / ISBN 13: 9780193154667

Published by Clarendon Press / Oxford University Press, Oxford/ New York, 1990

About this Item

Navy cloth boards with gilt spine lettering; blue dj with off-white lettering, bw illustration; xii, 260 pp, bw illustrations and music. Essays (most of them published previously) on the biblical and Jewish aspects of Schoenberg's work and public activities. Ch. 7 (pp. 116-149), "Unity and Strength: The Politics of Jewish Survival, " summarizes Schoenberg's involvement in Jewish policy in reaction to the Nazi rise to power. From 1933, he conceived and supported projects for the gradual emigration of the Jews from Germany. In his "Four-Point Program, " completed in 1938 after his emigration to the U.S., Schoenberg pleaded for the creation of a United Jewish Party to fight for emigration and for an independent Jewish state. The struggle against antisemitism and the Jewish anti-Nazi boycott he considered inadequate and a waste of energy. Pp. 206-223, "Postscript: Music, Race, and Purity, " survey the Nazi policy of Aryanization of German music institutions and the banning of Jewish composers. Appendix C (pp. 230-244) reprints "A Four-Point Program for Jewry." Contents: Prophecy and solitude -- The quest for language : 'oh word . that I lack' -- Creation, unity, and law -- Relevance and the future of opera : Arnold Schoenberg and Kurt Weill -- Dance on a volcano : Von heute auf morgen -- Unity and strength : the politics of Jewish survival -- The composer and the rabbi -- Prague and Jerusalem -- Faith and symbol -- Jewish music and a Jew's music -- Postscript, Music, race and purity -- Appendix A, 'Arnold Schönberg -- Prussian teacher of composition' / Alfred Heuss -- Appendix B, Der biblische Weg, conclusion of Act I -- Appendix C, A four-point program for Jewry / Arnold Schoenberg -- Appendix D, Arnold Schoenberg on the sacredness of art (letter to Oedon Partosh, Jerusalem). VG/VG (Ex-library with stamps and labels on spine, inside front and rear covers, ffep and block.).

Seller Inventory # 185790

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Arnold Schoenberg: The Composer as Jew
• Publisher: Clarendon Press / Oxford University Press, Oxford/ New York
• Publication Date: 1990
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0193154668
• ISBN 13: 9780193154667
• Binding: Hardcover
• Seller catalogs:
  • Music

About this title

Synopsis

Arnold Schoenberg was preoccupied with Judaism and biblical themes all his life, despite his conversion to Protestantism in 1898. Religious motives inspired an abortive symphonic project as early as 1912, long before the profoundly disturbing "A Survivor from Warsaw" which was composed in 1947. The essays collected in this volume represent a comprehensive attempt to shed light on the work and personality of the composer in this pertinent yet neglected context. Deeply sympathetic to his beliefs and understanding of his attitude to the politics of Jewish survival, Ringer holds that Schoenberg was both a religious artist on the one hand and, on the other, the product of an emancipated Central European Jewry, which, after decades of overt popular as well as governmental oppression, was to suffer virtually complete extinction. Widely knowledgeable about the historical, political and philosophical background, the author produces a book which will be of interest to musicologists and to students of 20th-century music and Jewish studies.

Review

"The broad approach and wide range of information that Ringer has brought to this collective work provide some fresh and interesting perspectives concerning the composer's era as well as his personal circumstances....Ringer helps us to understand an important composer as an individual whose creativity was generated both within human conflict and yet beyond it."-Notes"An excellent case study of a major creative individual whose understanding of his own world and his own creativity was strongly affected by specific ideas of what being Jewish meant. Ringer's book is valuable in that Schoenberg's music--not just the subjects but the form of the music itself--comes to be understood as Jewish. The importance of Ringer's study for the reception and the structuring of this music cannot be underestimated."--Current Musicology"This stimulating volume is significant not only for what it says about Schoenberg, but for its broader picture of the political and intellectual milieu of Jewish artists during the first half of the 20th century....Ringer's chilling and insightful commentary, which goes beyond musical boundaries, is highly recommended for large public libraries and for graduate and undergraduate music libraries."--Choice"No other writer has come nearly as close to identifying the essential roots and connections of Schoenberg's remarkable intellect as a Jewish composer. This fine book is not only an excellent historical and cultural examination of a great composer and his times but also a probing analysis of how, for Schoenberg, the Jewish God and the unity of the musical idea were essentially intertwined."--Shofar"[A] groundbreaking collection of essays....Professor Alexander L. Ringer for the first time explores the depth and subtlety of the interconnections between Schoenberg's faith and art in a beautifully shaped prose style rich in musical examples, laced with cross disciplinary allusions within a wide cultural context."--Musical Times "The broad approach and wide range of information that Ringer has brought to this collective work provide some fresh and interesting perspectives concerning the composer's era as well as his personal circumstances....Ringer helps us to understand an important composer as an individual whose creativity was generated both within human conflict and yet beyond it."-Notes "An excellent case study of a major creative individual whose understanding of his own world and his own creativity was strongly affected by specific ideas of what being Jewish meant. Ringer's book is valuable in that Schoenberg's music--not just the subjects but the form of the music itself--comes to be understood as Jewish. The importance of Ringer's study for the reception and the structuring of this music cannot be underestimated."--Current Musicology "This stimulating volume is significant not only for what it says about Schoenberg, but for its broader picture of the political and intellectual milieu of Jewish artists during the first half of the 20th century....Ringer's chilling and insightful commentary, which goes beyond musical boundaries, is highly recommended for large public libraries and for graduate and undergraduate music libraries."--Choice "No other writer has come nearly as close to identifying the essential roots and connections of Schoenberg's remarkable intellect as a Jewish composer. This fine book is not only an excellent historical and cultural examination of a great composer and his times but also a probing analysis of how, for Schoenberg, the Jewish God and the unity of the musical idea were essentially intertwined."--Shofar "[A] groundbreaking collection of essays....ProfessorAlexander L. Ringer for the first time explores the depth and subtlety of the interconnections between Schoenberg's faith and art in a beautifully shaped prose style rich in musical examples, laced with cross disciplinary allusions within a wide cultural context."--Musical Times "The broad approach and wide range of information that Ringer has brought to this collective work provide some fresh and interesting perspectives concerning the composer's era as well as his personal circumstances....Ringer helps us to understand an important composer as an individual whose creativity was generated both within human conflict and yet beyond it."-Notes "An excellent case study of a major creative individual whose understanding of his own world and his own creativity was strongly affected by specific ideas of what being Jewish meant. Ringer's book is valuable in that Schoenberg's music--not just the subjects but the form of the music itself--comes to be understood as Jewish. The importance of Ringer's study for the reception and the structuring of this music cannot be underestimated."--Current Musicology "This stimulating volume is significant not only for what it says about Schoenberg, but for its broader picture of the political and intellectual milieu of Jewish artists during the first half of the 20th century....Ringer's chilling and insightful commentary, which goes beyond musical boundaries, is highly recommended for large public libraries and for graduate and undergraduate music libraries."--Choice "No other writer has come nearly as close to identifying the essential roots and connections of Schoenberg's remarkable intellect as a Jewish composer. This fine book is not only an excellent historical and cultural examination of a great composer and his times but also a probing analysis of how, for Schoenberg, the Jewish God and the unity of the musical idea were essentiallyintertwined."--Shofar "[A] groundbreaking collection of essays....Professor Alexander L. Ringer for the first time explores the depth and subtlety of the interconnections between Schoenberg's faith and art in a beautifully shaped prose style rich in musical examples, laced with cross disciplinary allusions within a wide cultural context."--Musical Times "The broad approach and wide range of information that Ringer has brought to this collective work provide some fresh and interesting perspectives concerning the composer's era as well as his personal circumstances....Ringer helps us to understand an important composer as an individual whosecreativity was generated both within human conflict and yet beyond it."-Notes"An excellent case study of a major creative individual whose understanding of his own world and his own creativity was strongly affected by specific ideas of what being Jewish meant. Ringer's book is valuable in that Schoenberg's music--not just the subjects but the form of the music itself--comesto be understood as Jewish. The importance of Ringer's study for the reception and the structuring of this music cannot be underestimated."--Current Musicology"This stimulating volume is significant not only for what it says about Schoenberg, but for its broader picture of the political and intellectual milieu of Jewish artists during the first half of the 20th century....Ringer's chilling and insightful commentary, which goes beyond musical boundaries, is highly recommended for large public libraries and for graduate and undergraduate music libraries."--Choice"No other writer has come nearly as close to identifying the essential roots and connections of Schoenberg's remarkable intellect as a Jewish composer. This fine book is not only an excellent historical and cultural examination of a great composer and his times but also a probing analysis of how, for Schoenberg, the Jewish God and the unity of the musical idea were essentially intertwined."--Shofar"[A] groundbreaking collection ofessays....Professor Alexander L. Ringer for the first time explores the depth and subtlety of the interconnections between Schoenberg's faith and art in a beautifully shaped prose style rich in musical examples, laced with cross disciplinary allusions within a widecultural context."--Musical Times