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John Sullivan Dwight (1813-93) was, for much of the nineteenth century, America's leading music critic and an important figure among New England Transcendentalists. This biography charts his relationships with other writers and thinkers, as well as his evolution into a powerful and persuasive writer, while situating his story in its nineteenth century and Transcendental contexts. Dwight's enormous body of essays, reviews, and translations are illuminated in this biography and reveal the indelible influence that his newspaper,
Dwight's Journal of Music, had on music criticism--the impacts of which still resonate today.
List of contents
- Acknowledgements
- Illustrations
- Introduction
- PART I: Musica sub rosa
- 1. A Lineage so Grandly Historic
- The Dwights of Massachusetts
- Irrepressible Fondness
- Dwight's Early Education
- Genius and Enterprise
- 2. Musical Awakenings
- Life at Harvard
- Musica sub rosa
- Harvard Divinity School
- 3. The World Idealized
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Gardiner's The Music of Nature (1832)
- Goethe, Schiller and Carlyle
- George Ripley
- Early Major Writings
- 4. Preaching, The Dial, and the HMA
- Northampton
- The Dial (1840-1844)
- The Harvard Musical Association
- PART II: The Music of Transcendentalism
- 5. Dwight at Brook Farm
- Gentleman Farmers
- The Arts at Brook Farm
- The Emerging Journalist
- 6. The Harbinger, Beethoven, and the End of Brook Farm
- The Harbinger
- Beethoven Storms Boston
- Dwight's Fourieristic Writings
- Gone Like a Dream
- 7. The Maturing Critic
- Back in Boston
- The Daily Chronotype
- Sartain's Magazine
- Graham's Magazine
- New Prospects
- PART III: The World at Arm's Length
- 8. Dwight's Journal of Music
- Founding the Journal
- Models and Influences
- Early Reception of the Journal
- Oliver Ditson
- 9. Years in Days
- Dwight's Grand Tour
- Music in Europe
- The Great Eastern
- 10. Dwight on the Issues
- Responses to the Civil War
- Dwight contra Enterprise
- Native Musicians
- Music of the Future
- Murmurs of a Grander Future
- Music Libraries in Boston
- 11. The End of Dwight's Journal of Music
- We Still Live
- Howling Wolves
- The Journal Folds
- CODA
- 12. The Last Transcendentalist
- Life After the Journal
- The Perkins Institution for the Blind
- Last writings
- The Last Transcendentalist
- Appendices
- 1. Dwight's Harvard Forensics and Themes Topics
- 2. Selected Original Poems by Dwight
- 3. Musical Repertoire and Guest Artists at Brook Farm
- 4. Selected Song Translations and Adaptations by Dwight
- 5. Dwight's Major Original Essays in the Journal (1852-1881)
- 6. Dwight's European "Editorial Correspondences" for the Journal (1860-1861)
- Abbreviations
- John Sullivan Dwight: A Selected Bibliography
- Selected Bibliography
- Index
About the author
Bill F. Faucett is the author of Music in Boston: Composers, Events, and Ideas, 1852-1918 and George Whitefield Chadwick: The Life and Music of The Pride of New England, among other volumes.
Summary
John Sullivan Dwight (1813-93) was, for much of the nineteenth century, America's leading music critic. Born into a musical family and educated at several premier Boston schools, he fell under the spell of New England Transcendentalism and befriended Ralph Waldo Emerson, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Margaret Fuller, George Ripley, and others of a similarly progressive mindset. Dwight resided at the socialist/utopian community of Brook Farm where he learned the art of journalism and wrote on many topics--Transcendentalism, of course, but especially on music and musical performance. After the demise of Brook Farm and several years as a journeyman writer, Dwight launched Dwight's Journal of Music: A Paper of Art and Literature in 1852. It was a newspaper that firmly established him as a serious music critic and in its time spoke to America's growing appetite for art music.
By charting Dwight's relationships with other writers, musicians, and thinkers, as well as his evolution into a powerful and persuasive writer in his own right, this book situates his story in its nineteenth century and Transcendental contexts and provides the first thorough account of music and the arts at Brook Farm. Dwight's enormous body of essays, reviews, translations, correspondence, and other various writings are illuminated in this biography and reveal the indelible influence Dwight's Journal had on music criticism--the impacts of which resonate today.
Additional text
This book finally offers an answer to the question of who this Dwight of Dwight's Journal really was. Constituting the last word on John Sullivan Dwight, this book will interest those in music and/or American studies.
