Reading Critics Reading: Opera and Ballet Criticism in France from the Revolution to 1848

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Contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
I: Reading Critics
A Dilettante at the Opera: Issues in the Criticism of Julien-Louis Geoffroy, 1800-1814
The Professional Dilletante: Ludovic Vitet and Le Globe
Gluck, Berlioz, and Castil-Blaze: The Poetics and Reception of French Opera
II: Reading Grand Opera
Robert le Diable and Louis-Philippe the King
Ceremony, Celebration, and Spectacle in La Juive
Mourning the Duc d'Orleans: Donizetti's Dom Sebastien and the Political Meanings of Grand Opera
III: Reading Ballet
Bodies at the Opera: Art and the Hermaphrodite in the Dance Criticism of Theophile Gautier
Bibliography
Index

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About

This book is among the first to examine French opera and ballet criticism during the first half of the nineteenth century both as a historical and a literary phenomenon. It thus provides a new and badly needed perspective for scholars and other commentators who have often been willing to treat the journalistic responses to such musical genres chiefly as a simple source of factual information. The essays, taken from a conference in Oxford in 1996, explore the kinds of problem encountered and the types of methodology that might be employed in trying to interpret these critical responses; they throw light on such aspects as the cultural attitudes underlying the writers' rhetoric, the aesthetic stances and ideological agendas at play, and how modes of production influenced content.

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This book's view from multiple perspectives must enrich future historical narratives of the most vital musical scene in Europe

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