Metaphysics and Music in Adorno and Heidegger

229 Pages·2015·2.44 MB·English

by  Wesley Phillips

Metaphysics and Music in Adorno and Heidegger
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Metaphysics and Music in
Adorno and Heidegger
Wesley Phillips
Independent Scholar, UK
© Wesley Phillips 2015
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in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2015 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
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ISBN: 978–1–137–48724–7
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Phillips, Wesley, 1976–
Metaphysics and music in Adorno and Heidegger / Wesley Phillips.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978–1–137–48724–7
1. Music – Philosophy and aesthetics. 2. Adorno, Theodor W.,
1903–1969 – Criticism and interpretation. 3. Heidegger, Martin,
1889–1976 – Criticism and interpretation. 4. Wagner, Richard,
1813–1883 – Criticism and interpretation. I. Title.
ML3800.P455 2015
781.1(cid:2)7—dc23 2015004273
For Alban
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Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgements x
Introduction 1
1 Melancholy Science as Dissonant System 11
Resignation and the infinite task 11
Language, system, music 14
Melancholy science in Schelling and Benjamin 21
The idea of natural history 30
Heidegger’s melancholy history? 35
Ideas of music and the musical idea 37
Dissonant nominalism 42
2 Twisting Free With/Of Wagner 46
The ‘actuality’ of Wagner 46
Adorno on Wagner 48
Ego(t)ism and love 48
Dialectic of decadence 54
Willing and waiting (I) 62
Heidegger on Wagner 63
Turning Heidegger against Heidegger 63
Aesthetics of willing 65
M usic or poetry? 70
Twisting free as Aufhebung 74
Willing and waiting (II) 80
3 The Dialectical Image of Music 82
Two spheres of musical experience 82
Music as image(less) 86
Schematism, rhythm, temporalisation 89
Fantasy and spectacle 98
Nono’s mimesis 103
Nono’s late fermata 109
Turning around the dialectical image 111
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viii Contents
4 Invincible in the Wasteland? Music, Space and Utopia 113
Negativity in Cacciari and Adorno 113
The metropolis and tragic negativity 115
Mimesis and rationality 121
Non-place and non-dwelling 123
Intermezzo: of music and space 129
Nono’s spaces of resistance 131
Prometeo and the place of the artwork 134
5 The Expression of Waiting in Vain 142
Adorno 142
The promise of metaphysics 142
After metaphysics? 148
Heidegger 155
Boredom as fundamental attunement 155
World, whole, history 159
Adorno and Heidegger 164
Boredom and waiting 164
Waiting or destining? 169
Notes 175
Bibliography 203
I ndex 213
Preface
For various reasons, the current book was a long time in the making,
and the author’s research focus has evolved over this time. For an indi-
cation of other research undertaken in recent years, a list of the author’s
publications may be found in the Bibliography section towards the end
of this book.
Three subsections have appeared elsewhere in different forms. An
earlier version of part of Chapter 1 appeared as, ‘Melancholy Science?
German Idealism and Critical Theory Reconsidered’, in T elos, 157
(2011). A musicologically and historically elaborated version of material
relating to Luigi Nono, here represented in the third and fourth chap-
ters, appeared as, ‘Spaces of Resistance: The Adorno–Nono Complex’, in
Twentieth Century Music , 9 (2012).
All translations into English are by the author unless stated otherwise
in the notes.
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