Richard Wagner

Few of the great composers can claim a body of work as influential and contentious as Richard Wagner; his life and compositions remain intertwined with the great upheavals of his time, and this often obscures a dispassionate critical assessment of his output.
In Richard Wagner Raymond Furness provides a clear and balanced view of Wagners great achievements, without neglecting the controversies in his life and art. Using the composers wide-ranging engagement with mythology as his starting point, Furness explores Wagners music and extensive literary output. As well as giving the reader a clear insight into The Ring and Wagners other essential works, the book also deals with often-neglected fragments such as Wieland the Smith, The Mines at Falun and The Visitors, providing a more rounded critical picture of a composer whose great operatic works often overshadow the rest of his canon.
Containing up-to-date dissections of recent Bayreuth productions and a refreshingly uncluttered approach to a much-misunderstood life, Furnesss Richard Wagner will engage both those new to the life of the composer, as well as his many life-long devotees.

About the author

Raymond Furness is former Chair of German at St Andrew’s University, Scotland. He is author or editor of many books on German literature and culture, including A Companion to Twentieth-century German Literature (1991), Zarathustra’s Children (2000) and On Heligoland (2008).

Summary

Published at the bicentennial of his birth, Raymond Furness’s Richard Wagner provides a clear and balanced view of both Wagner’s great successes and the controversies generated by his life and art.

Product details

• Authors: Ray Furness, Raymond Furness, Furness Ray
• Publisher: Reaktion Books
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 01.07.2013
• EAN: 9781780231822
• ISBN: 978-1-78023-182-2
• No. of pages: 224
• Series: Critical Lives; Reaktion Books - Critical Live; Critical Lives; Reaktion Books - Critical Live
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Music > Monographs; Individual composers & musicians, specific bands & groups, MUSIC / History & Criticism, MUSIC / Individual Composer & Musician, MUSIC / Genres & Styles / Classical, MUSIC / Genres & Styles / Opera, Opera, Biography: arts & entertainment, Romanticism, Music reviews & criticism, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Music, Musicians, singers, bands and groups, Composers and songwriters, Music reviews and criticism, Biography: arts and entertainment, Classical Music (C 1750 To C 1830), Classical style, Romantic Music (C 1830 To C 1900), Art music, orchestral and formal music