Overview

The Vienna in which Franz Schubert lived for the thirty-one years of his life was not just a city of music, dance, and coffeehouses - a centre of important achievements in the arts. It was also the capital of an empire that was constantly at war in the composer's youth and that became a police state during his maturity. Now, in the bicentennial of Schubert's birth, this book paints a picture of the culture, society, and politics of Schubert's Vienna. Authorities examine Vienna's history and politics, class structure, and social conventions. They describe private and public entertainments, including music and dance, as well as classical and popular Viennese theatre, both of which achieved special greatness in the early nineteenth century. They investigate the historical layers of architecture and sculpture that preserved Vienna's past or reflected the imperatives of Schubert's time. They analyze genres of painting that exemplified or went beyond the ideals of Biedermeier society. And they discuss literary currents reflected in (or absent from) the poetry that fired Schubert's musical imagination.

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A useful book for those wishing a cram course about one of the 19th century's most prolific composers and his times. Vienna's moniker as the City of Music may suggest a place of flowers and waltzes, but such was not the case at all at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th, when composer Franz Schubert lived his 31 short years there. Marked first by war and then by a peacetime filled with repression and censorship, Vienna was a city where often the safest place to be was inside. This book methodically details life in Schubert's Vienna. Unlike his musical contemporary Beethoven, who moved in higher social circles, Schubert lived a decidedly middle-class life. It is this social stratum that this volume, edited by Erickson (dean of Arts and Humanities at Queens College, City Univ. of New York), chronicles in meticulous depth. The collection has chapters written by various scholars from around the world on everything from the politics of the times to other popular art forms, such as Viennese theater and Biedermeier painting. The book follows a logical order, beginning with an overview and analysis of the era's repressive politics. Establishing that aura of fear and reign of censorship sets the scene for discussion of their impact on Viennese culture - the retreat to the safety of home, for instance, where music became a vital recreation in the salons - and its art forms. Music was among the safest of the arts, because, given its abstractness, it was almost impossible to prove that a composer had nefarious political thoughts as he wrote a particular piece. Scholarly writing whose readability varies depending on the contributor but overall an asset to the library of anyone interested in music or Vienna. (Kirkus Reviews)

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