Poetry, were it the rudest, so it be sincere, is the attempt which man makes to render his existence harmonious, the utmost he can do for that end; it springs therefore from his whole feelings, opinions, activity, and takes its character from these. It may be called the music of the whole inner being.
I am an excitable person who only understands life lyrically, musically, in whom feelings are much stronger as reason. I am so thirsty for the marvelous that only the marvelous has power over me. Anything I can not transform into something marvelous, I let go. Reality doesn't impress me. I only believe in intoxication, in ecstasy, and when ordinary life shackles me, I escape, one way or another. No more walls.
That play of black upon white, white upon black, has the intent and takes the form of creative art. It has in it a flow of the spirit and a harmony of music. Everything is lost when suddenly a false note is struck, or one party in a duet suddenly launches forth on an eccentric flight of his own. A masterpiece of a game can be ruined by insensitivity to the feelings of an adversary.
We're constantly being bombarded by insulting and humiliating music, which people are making for you the way they make those Wonder Bread products. Just as food can be bad for your system, music can be bad for your spirtual and emotional feelings. It might taste good or clever, but in the long run, it's not going to do anything for you. -- Bob Dylan, "LA Times", September 5, 1984
It is not only as a composer that the life of Berlioz is full of interest, although in this respect his achievement is singularly significant for the comprehension of the modern spirit in music. But it is as the symbol of French romanticism in the whole domain of aesthetic perception that his pre-eminence has come to be recognized. His _Mémoires_ (begun in London in 1848 and finished in 1865) illustrate this romantic spirit at its highest elevation as well as at its lowest depths. Victor Hugo was a romantic, Musset was a romantic, but Berlioz was romanticism itself. As a boy he is in despair over the despair of Dido, and his breath is taken away at Virgil's "Quaesivit coelo lucem ingemuitque reperta." At the age of twelve he is in love with "Estelle," whom he meets fifty years afterwards. The scene is described by himself (1865) with minute fidelity--a scene which Flaubert must have known by heart when he wrote its parallel in the novel _L'Éducation sentimentale_. The romance of this meeting between the man--old, isolated, unspeakably sad, with the halo of public fame burning round him--and the woman--old also, a mother, a widow, whose beauty he had worshipped when she was eighteen--is striking. In a frame of chastened melancholy and joy at the sight of Estelle, Berlioz goes to dine with Patti and her family. Patti, on the threshold of her career, pets Berlioz with such uncontrollable affection, that as the composer wrote a description of his feelings he was overwhelmed at the bitterness of fate. What would he not have given for Estelle to show him such affection! Patti seemed to him like a marvellous bird with diamond wings flitting round his head, resting on his shoulder, plucking his hair and singing her most joyous songs to the accompaniment of beating wings. "I was enchanted but not moved. The fact is that the young, beautiful, dazzling, famous virtuoso who at the age of twenty-two has already seen musical Europe and America at her feet, does not win the power of love in me; and the aged woman, sad, obscure, ignorant of art, possesses my soul as she did in the days gone by, as she will do until my last day." If this episode touches the sublime, it may be urged with almost equal truth that his description of the exhumation of his two wives and their reburial in a single tomb touches the ridiculous. And yet the scene is described with a perception of all the detail which would call for the highest praise in a novelist. Perhaps some parallel between the splendid and the ridiculous in this singular figure may be seen in the comparison of Nadar's caricature with Charpentier's portrait of the composer. Entry: BERLIOZ
_Early Lyric Poetry._--Side by side with these two forms of literature, the epics and romances of the higher classes, and the fabliau, which, at least in its original, represented rather the feelings of the lower, there grew up a third kind, consisting of purely lyrical poetry. The song literature of medieval France is extremely abundant and beautiful. From the 12th to the 15th century it received constant accessions, some signed, some anonymous, some purely popular in their character, some the work of more learned writers, others again produced by members of the aristocracy. Of the latter class it may fairly be said that the catalogue of royal and noble authors boasts few if any names superior to those of Thibaut de Champagne, king of Navarre at the beginning of the 13th century, and Charles d'Orléans, the father of Louis XII., at the beginning of the 15th. Although much of this lyric poetry is anonymous, the more popular part of it almost entirely so, yet M. Paulin Paris was able to enumerate some hundreds of French chansonniers between the 11th and the 13th century. The earliest song literature, chiefly known in the delightful collection of Bartsch (_Altfranzösische Romanzen und Pastourellen_), is mainly sentimental in character. The collector divides it under the two heads of romances and pastourelles, the former being usually the celebration of the loves of a noble knight and maiden, and recounting how Belle Doette or Eglantine or Oriour sat at her windows or in the tourney gallery, or embroidering silk and samite in her chamber, with her thoughts on Gerard or Guy or Henry,--the latter somewhat monotonous but naïve and often picturesque recitals, very often in the first person, of the meeting of an errant knight or minstrel with a shepherdess, and his cavalier but not always successful wooing. With these, some of which date from the 12th century, may be contrasted, at the other end of the medieval period, the more varied and popular collection dating in their present form from the 15th century, and published in 1875 by M. Gaston Paris. In both alike, making allowance for the difference of their age and the state of the language, may be noticed a charming lyrical faculty and great skill in the elaboration of light and suitable metres. Especially remarkable is the abundance of refrains of an admirably melodious kind. It is said that more than 500 of these exist. Among the lyric writers of these four centuries whose names are known may be mentioned Audefroi le Bastard (12th century), the author of the charming song of _Belle Idoine_, and others no way inferior, Quesnes de Bethune, the ancestor of Sully, whose song-writing inclines to a satirical cast in many instances, the Vidame de Chartres, Charles d'Anjou, King John of Brienne, the châtelain de Coucy, Gace Bruslé, Colin Muset, while not a few writers mentioned elsewhere--Guyot de Provins, Adam de la Halle, Jean Bodel and others--were also lyrists. But none of them, except perhaps Audefroi, can compare with Thibaut IV. (1201-1253), who united by his possessions and ancestry a connexion with the north and the south, and who employed the methods of both districts but used the language of the north only. Thibaut was supposed to be the lover of Blanche of Castile, the mother of St Louis, and a great deal of his verse is concerned with his love for her. But while knights and nobles were thus employing lyric poetry in courtly and sentimental verse, lyric forms were being freely employed by others, both of high and low birth, for more general purposes. Blanche and Thibaut themselves came in for contemporary lampoons, and both at this time and in the times immediately following, a cloud of writers composed light verse, sometimes of a lyric sometimes of a narrative kind, and sometimes in a mixture of both. By far the most remarkable of these is Ruteboeuf (a name which is perhaps a nickname), the first of a long series of French poets to whom in recent days the title Bohemian has been applied, who passed their lives between gaiety and misery, and celebrated their lot in both conditions with copious verse. Ruteboeuf is among the earliest French writers who tell us their personal history and make personal appeals. But he does not confine himself to these. He discusses the history of his times, upbraids the nobles for their desertion of the Latin empire of Constantinople, considers the expediency of crusading, inveighs against the religious orders, and takes part in the disputes between the pope and the king. He composes pious poetry too, and in at least one poem takes care to distinguish between the church which he venerates and the corrupt churchmen whom he lampoons. Besides Ruteboeuf the most characteristic figure of his class and time (about the middle of the 13th century) is Adam de la Halle, commonly called the Hunchback of Arras. The earlier poems of Adam are of a sentimental character, the later ones satirical and somewhat ill-tempered. Such, for instance, is his invective against his native city. But his chief importance consists in his _jeux_, the _Jeu de la feuillie_, the _Jeu de Robin et Marion_, dramatic compositions which led the way to the regular dramatic form. Indeed the general tendency of the 13th century is to satire, fable and farce, even more than to serious or sentimental poetry. We should perhaps except the _lais_, the chief of which are known under the name of Marie de France. These lays are exclusively Breton in origin, though not in application, and the term seems originally to have had reference rather to the music to which they were sung than to the manner or matter of the pieces. Some resemblance to these lays may perhaps be traced in the genuine Breton songs published by M. Luzel. The subjects of the lais are indifferently taken from the Arthurian cycle, from ancient story, and from popular tradition, and, at any rate in Marie's hands, they give occasion for some passionate, and in the modern sense really romantic, poetry. The most famous of all is the _Lay of the Honeysuckle_, traditionally assigned to Sir Tristram. Entry: FRENCH
While Oliver was still a child his father was presented to the living of Kilkenny West, in the county of West Meath. This was worth about £200 a year. The family accordingly quitted their cottage at Pallas for a spacious house on a frequented road, near the village of Lissoy. Here the boy was taught his letters by a relative and dependent, Elizabeth Delap, and was sent in his seventh year to a village school kept by an old quartermaster on half-pay, who professed to teach nothing but reading, writing and arithmetic, but who had an inexhaustible fund of stories about ghosts, banshees and fairies, about the great Rapparee chiefs, Baldearg O'Donnell and galloping Hogan, and about the exploits of Peterborough and Stanhope, the surprise of Monjuich and the glorious disaster of Brihuega. This man must have been of the Protestant religion; but he was of the aboriginal race, and not only spoke the Irish language, but could pour forth unpremeditated Irish verses. Oliver early became, and through life continued to be, a passionate admirer of the Irish music, and especially of the compositions of Carolan, some of the last notes of whose harp he heard. It ought to be added that Oliver, though by birth one of the Englishry, and though connected by numerous ties with the Established Church, never showed the least sign of that contemptuous antipathy with which, in his days, the ruling minority in Ireland too generally regarded the subject majority. So far indeed was he from sharing in the opinions and feelings of the caste to which he belonged that he conceived an aversion to the Glorious and Immortal Memory, and, even when George III. was on the throne, maintained that nothing but the restoration of the banished dynasty could save the country. Entry: GOLDSMITH
The most copious, and in their day most esteemed, hymn-writers of the first half of the 17th century, were Johann Heermann and Johann Rist. Heermann, a pastor in Silesia, the theatre (in a peculiar degree) of war and persecution, experienced in his own person a very large share of the miseries of the time, and several times narrowly escaped a violent death. His _Devoti musica cordis_, published in 1630, reflects the feelings natural under such circumstances. With a correct style and good versification, his tone is subjective, and the burden of his hymns is not praise, but prayer. Among his works (which enter largely into most German hymn-books), two of the best are the "Song of Tears" and the "Song of Comfort," translated by Miss Winkworth in her _Christian Singers of Germany_. Rist published about 600 hymns, "pressed out of him," as he said, "by the cross." He was a pastor, and son of a pastor, in Holstein, and lived after the peace to enjoy many years of prosperity, being appointed poet-laureate to the emperor and finally ennobled. The bulk of his hymns, like those of other copious writers, are of inferior quality; but some, particularly those for Advent, Epiphany, Easter Eve and on Angels, are very good. They are more objective than those of Heermann, and written, upon the whole, in a more manly spirit. Next to Heermann and Rist in fertility of production, and above them in poetical genius, was Simon Dach, professor of poetry at Königsberg, who died in 1659. Miss Winkworth ranks him high among German poets, "for the sweetness of form and depth of tender contemplative emotion to be found in his verses." Entry: 5
The hymns produced during the Thirty Years' War are characteristic of that unhappy time, which (as Miss Winkworth says) "caused religious men to look away from this world," and made their songs more and more expressive of personal feelings. In point of refinement and graces of style, the hymn-writers of this period excelled their predecessors. Their taste was chiefly formed by the influence of Martin Opitz, the founder of what has been called the "first Silesian school" of German poetry, who died comparatively young in 1639, and who, though not of any great original genius, exercised much power as a critic. Some of the best of these works were by men who wrote little. In the famous battle-song of Gustavus Adolphus, published (1631) after the victory of Breitenfeld, for the use of his army, "Verzage nicht du Häuflein klein" ("Fear not, O little flock, the foe"), we have almost certainly a composition of the hero-king himself, the versification corrected by his chaplain Jakob Fabricius (1593-1654) and the music composed by Michael Altenburg, whose name has been given to the hymn. This, with Luther's paraphrase of the 67th Psalm, was sung by Gustavus and his soldiers before the battle of Lützen in 1632. Two very fine hymns, one of prayer for deliverance and peace, the other of trust in God under calamities, were written about the same time by Matthäus Löwenstern, a saddler's son, poet, musician and statesman, who was ennobled after the peace by the emperor Ferdinand III. Martin Rinckhart, in 1636, wrote the "Chorus of God's faithful children" ("Nun danket alle Gott"--"Now thank we all our God"), introduced by Mendelssohn in his "Lobgesang," which has been called the "Te Deum" of Germany, being usually sung on occasions of public thanksgiving. Weissel, in 1635, composed a beautiful Advent hymn ("Lift up your heads, ye mighty gates"), and J. M. Meyfart, professor of theology at Erfurt, in 1642, a fine adaptation of the ancient "Urbs beata Hierusalem." The hymn of trust in Providence by George Neumark, librarian to that duke of Weimar ("Wer nur den lieben Gott lässt walten"--"Leave God to order all thy ways"), is scarcely, if at all, inferior to that of Paul Gerhardt on the same theme. Paul Flemming, a great traveller and lover of nature, who died in 1639, also wrote excellent compositions, coloured by the same tone of feeling; and some, of great merit, were composed, soon after the close of the war, by Louisa Henrietta, electress of Brandenburg, granddaughter of the famous admiral Coligny, and mother of the first king of Prussia. With these may be classed (though of later date) a few striking hymns of faith and prayer under mental anxiety, by Anton Ulrich, duke of Brunswick. Entry: 5
Now the emotions of music when music goes along with words, whether in the shape of actual song or even of the instrumental accompaniment of song, are no doubt in a certain sense attended with definite ideas; those, namely, which are expressed by the words themselves. But the same ideas would be conveyed to the mind equally well by the same words if they were simply spoken. What the music contributes is a special element of its own, an element of pure emotion, aroused through the sense of hearing, which heightens the effect of the words upon the feelings without helping to elucidate them for the understanding. Nay, it is well known that a song well sung produces its intended effect upon the feelings almost as fully though we fail to catch the words or are ignorant of the language to which they belong. Thus the view of Aristotle cannot be defended on the ground that he was familiar with music only in an elementary form, and principally as the direct accompaniment of words, and that in his day the modern development of the art, as an art for building up constructions of independent sound, vast and intricate fabrics of melody and harmony detached from words, was a thing not yet imagined. That is perfectly true; the immense technical and intellectual development of music, both in its resources and its capacities, is an achievement of the modern world; but the essential character of musical sound is the same in its most elementary as in its most complicated stage. Its privilege is to give delight, not by communicating definite ideas, or calling up particular images, but by appealing to certain organic sensibilities in our nerves of hearing, and through such appeal expressing on the one part and arousing on the other a unique kind of emotion. The emotion caused by music may be altogether independent of any ideas conveyable by words. Or it may serve to intensify and enforce other emotions arising at the same time in connexion with the ideas conveyed by words; and it was one of the contentions of Richard Wagner that in the former phase the art is now exhausted, and that only in the latter are new conquests in store for it. But in either case the music is the music, and _is like nothing else_; it is no representation or similitude of anything whatsoever. Entry: 2
Most of the common properties which have been recognized by consent as peculiar to the group of fine arts will be found on examination to be implied in, or deducible from, the one fundamental character generally claimed for them, namely, that they exist independently of direct practical necessity or utility. Let us take, first, a point relating to the frame of mind of the recipient, as distinguished from the producer, of the pleasures of fine art. It is an observation as old as Aristotle that such pleasures differ from most other pleasures of experience in that they are disinterested, in the sense that they are not such as nourish a man's body nor add to his riches; they are not such as can gratify him, when he receives them, by the sense of advantage or superiority over his fellow-creatures; they are not such as one human being can in any sense receive exclusively from the object which bestows them. Thus it is evidently characteristic of a beautiful building that its beauty cannot be monopolized, but can be seen and admired by the inhabitants of a whole city and by all visitors for all generations. The same thing is true of a picture or a statue, except in so far as an individual possessor may choose to keep such a possession to himself, in which case his pride in exclusive ownership is a sentiment wholly independent of his pleasure in artistic contemplation. Similarly, music is composed to be sung or played for the enjoyment of many at a time, and for such enjoyment a hundred years hence as much as to-day. Poetry is written to be read by all readers for ever who care for the ideas and feelings of the poet, and can apprehend the meaning and melody of his language. Hence, though we can speak of a class of the producers of fine art, we cannot speak of a class of its consumers, only of its recipients or enjoyers. If we consider other pleasures which might seem to be analogous to those of fine art, but to which common consent yet declines to allow that character, we shall see that one reason is that such pleasures are not in their nature thus disinterested. Thus the sense of smell and taste have pleasures of their own like the senses of sight and hearing, and pleasures neither less poignant nor very much less capable of fine graduation and discrimination than those. Why, then, is the title of fine art not claimed for any skill in arranging and combining them? Why are there no recognized arts of savours and scents corresponding in rank to the arts of forms, colours and sounds--or at least none among Western nations, for in Japan, it seems, there is a recognized and finely regulated social art of the combination and succession of perfumes? An answer commonly given is that sight and hearing are intellectual and therefore higher senses, that through them we have our avenues to all knowledge and all ideas of things outside us; while taste and smell are unintellectual and therefore lower senses, through which few such impressions find their way to us as help to build up our knowledge and our ideas. Perhaps a more satisfactory reason why there are no fine arts of taste and smell--or let us in deference to Japanese modes leave out smell, and say of taste only--is this, that savours yield only private pleasures, which it is not possible to build up into separate and durable schemes such that every one may have the benefit of them, and such as cannot be monopolized or used up. If against this it is contended that what the programme of a performance is in the musical art, the same is a _menu_ in the culinary, and that practically it is no less possible to serve up a thousand times and to a thousand different companies the same dinner than the same symphony, we must fall back upon that still more fundamental form of the distinction between the aesthetic and non-aesthetic bodily senses, upon which the physiological psychologists of the English school lay stress. We must say that the pleasures of taste cannot be pleasures of fine art, because their enjoyment is too closely associated with the most indispensable and the most strictly personal of utilities, eating and drinking. To pass from these lower pleasures to the highest; consider the nature of the delight derived from the contemplation, by the person who is their object, of the signs and manifestations of love. That at least is a beautiful experience; why is the pleasure which it affords not an artistic pleasure either? Why, in order to receive an artistic pleasure from human signs and manifestations of this kind, are we compelled to go to the theatre and see them exhibited in favour of a third person who is not really their object any more than ourselves? This is so, for one reason, evidently, because of the difference between art and nature. Not to art, but to nature and life, belongs love where it is really felt, with its attendant train of vivid hopes, fears, passions and contingencies. To art belongs love displayed where it is not really felt; and in this sphere, along with reality and spontaneousness of the display, and along with its momentous bearings, there disappear all those elements of pleasure in its contemplation which are not disinterested--the elements of personal exultation and self-congratulation, the pride of exclusive possession or acceptance, all these emotions, in short, which are summed up in the lover's triumphant monosyllable, "Mine." Thus, from the lowest point of the scale to the highest, we may observe that the element of personal advantage or monopoly in human gratifications seems to exclude, them from the kingdom of fine art. The pleasures of fine art, so far as concerns their passive or receptive part, seem to define themselves as pleasures of gratified contemplation, but of such contemplation only when it is disinterested--which is simply another way of saying, when it is unconcerned with ideas of utility. Entry: I