Tchaikovsky has long intrigued music-lovers as a figure who straddles
many borders--between East and West, nationalism and cosmopolitanism,
tradition and innovation, tenderness and bombast, masculine and
feminine. In this book, through consideration of his music and
biography, scholars from several disciplines explore the many sides of
Tchaikovsky. The volume presents for the first time in English some of
Tchaikovsky's own writings about music, as well as three influential
articles, previously available only in German, from the 1993 Tübingen
conference commemorating the centennial of Tchaikovsky's death.
Tchaikovsky's distinguished biographer, Alexander Poznansky, reveals new
findings from his most recent archival explorations in Kiln,
Tchaikovsky's home. Poznansky makes accessible for the first time the
full text of perviously censored letters, clarifying issues about the
composer's life that until now have remained mere conjecture. Leon
Botstein examines the world of realist art that was so influential in
Tchaikovsky's day, while Janet Kennedy describes how interpretations of
Tchaikovsky's ballet Sleeping Beauty act as a barometer of the
aesthetic and even political climate of several generations. Natalia
Minibayeva elucidates the First Orchestral Suite as a workshop for
Tchaikovsky's composition of large-scale works, including symphony,
opera, and ballet, while Susanne Dammann discusses the problematic
Fourth Symphony as a work perfectly poised between East and West.
Arkadii Klimovitsky considers Tchaikovsky's role as a link between
Russia's Golden and Silver Ages. The extensive interaction between music
and literature in this period forms the basis for Rosamund Bartlett's
essay on creative parallels between Tchaikovsky and Chekhov. Richard
Wortman describes the political climate at the end of Tchaikovsky's
life, including Alexander III's mania for re-creating
seventeenth-century Russian culture. Caryl Emerson, Kadja Grönke, and
Leslie Kearney examine a number of issues raised by Tchaikovsky's
operas. Marina Kostalevsky translates Nikolai Kashkin's 1899 review of
Tchaikovsky's controversial opera Orleanskaia Deva (The Maid of
Orleans).
The book concludes with examples of theoretical writing by Tchaikovsky
and Rimsky-Korsakov, authors of Russia's first two systematic books on
music theory. Lyle Neff translates and provides commentary on
compositional issues that Tchaikovsky discusses in personal
correspondence, as well as Rimsky-Korsakov's analysis of his own opera
Snegurochka (The Snow Maiden). Tchaikovsky and His World will change
how we understand the life, works, and intellectual milieu of one of the
most important and beloved composers of the nineteenth century.
Originally published in 1998.
The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand
technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from
the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions
preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting
them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the
Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich
scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by
Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
