WRITING ABSOLUTE MUSIC: MODERNITY’S LINGUISTIC SYMPHONY

231 Pages·2010·0.85 MB·English

WRITING ABSOLUTE MUSIC: MODERNITY’S LINGUISTIC SYMPHONY

Shelley L. Hay

A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in
partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the
Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures.

Chapel Hill
2010

Approved by:

Dr. Clayton Koelb (Advisor)
Dr. Alice Kuzniar
Dr. Jonathan Hess
Dr. Eric Downing
Dr. Thomas Pfau
©2010
Shelley L. Hay
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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ABSTRACT

Shelley L. Hay
Writing Absolute Music: Modernity’s Linguistic Symphony
(Under the direction of Dr. Clayton Koelb)
Writing Absolute Music: Modernity’s Linguistic Symphony explores one facet of the
relationship between music and language in 19th- and 20th-century German literature and
philosophy. By examining the vital role that the idea of “absolute music” has played in works
by thinkers and authors such as Novalis, Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, and
Hermann Hesse, I argue that the somewhat counterintuitive phenomenon of writing about
music in order to overcome problems associated with language originates in early German
Romanticism and continues to influence German authors throughout the first half of the 20th
century. Focusing in large part on Hesse’s masterpiece, Das Glasperlenspiel, I establish that
authors who seek to overcome language’s inherent limitations and approach a transcendental
reality by emulating musical structures in their novels and short stories ultimately fail to
achieve their fundamental goal. I demonstrate that Hesse is the last great heir to this
Romantic legacy and that the failure of Das Glasperlenspiel to access an absolute through
words explains the shift in German literature around 1950 away from the Romantic ideal of
turning language into music toward a less optimistic, more humble depiction of music’s role
within works of German literature.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

There are a number of people who helped make the completion of this dissertation
possible. I am grateful to my committee members and my fellow graduate students at UNC
and Duke for their comments and suggestions throughout the various stages of this project.
A special thanks to Dr. Alice Kuzniar for beginning this journey with me. Your general
general enthusiasm for my project was infectious. I am especially grateful to my dissertation
advisor, Dr. Clayton Koelb. You always seemed to know exactly what to say and when to
say it. Your pep talks helped me continue writing during the most challenging times. To my
Mom, Dad, and Davi: Thank you for your unwavering love and support during this whole
process. And most of all, thanks to my friend and colleague, Rebeccah (Bess) Dawson. I
would not have survived graduate school without you.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of abbreviations………………………………………………………………………..viii

Introduction: Hermann Hesse’s Romantic heritage………………………………..………….1

I. The popularity and “Tabuisierung” of Hesse’s works…………….………………...1

II. Romantic influences in Hesse’s writing………………………..………..…………2

III. The origins and meaning of absolute music…………….....……………..…….....4

Chapter One: The influence of absolute music in 19th-century German literature and
philosophy………..………………………………………………………………..…11

I. Novalis’ cosmic symphony……………………..…………………………..……..11

II. Schopenhauer and the world as Will or music……………..……….….....………23

III. Apollonian vs. Dionysian forces: Nietzsche and Wagner…………………..…...35

Chapter Two: Hesse’s Glasperlenspiel and the failure of language……...…………..……...46

I. Expectations and failures of language in Hesse’s early works…………..………...46

II. The first failure of language: depicting empirical reality……………………..…..57

i. The chronicler’s battle with history ………………………………….…....58

III. The second failure of language: communication…………………………..…….68

i. Plinio Designori and the impossibility of communication between
Castalia and the outside world…………………………….…………………68

ii. The Musikmeister and the inability to communicate within Castalia….....77

IV. The third failure of language: transcending empirical boundaries……..………..83

i. Knecht’s desire to access a non-phenomenal reality.……... ………...……83

ii. Knecht’s first poetic attempts……………………………..………………90
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iii. Knecht’s hope for the glass bead game………………………………..…97

iv. The Age of the Feuilleton and the creation of the glass bead game...…..105

v. Knecht’s disillusionment and the failure of the glass bead game……..…114

Chapter Three: Hesse’s Glasperlenspiel and the power of music………….….…………...123

I. The musical solution……………………………..…………………………….…123

II. Music as the key to communication……………………………..………………125

i. The beauty of non-instrumental, 18th-century music……………….....….126

ii. Music aiding linguistic communication: Pater Jakobus and the
Designoris…………………………………………………………………..133

iii. Music replacing language: Der Musikmeister…………….…………….137

III. Describing empirical reality through musical analogies……………………..…140

i. Romantic analogies in Hesse’s earlier works……………..……………...141

ii. Castalia’s musical hierarchy……………………………..………………148

iii. The ultimate musical analogy: the glass bead game……………….……156

IV. Absolute music…………………………………..……………………………..163

i. Writing about absolute music…………………………………....………164

ii. Writing absolute music: transmedialization………………………..……173

V. The end of a dream…………………………………………..………………….197

Conclusion: Music in literature after the Second World War..…………….………..…..…204

I. Hesse’s personal failure…………………………..………………………………204

II. The atrocities of war and its effect on art…………………………..……………206

III. The physical and sensual in literary depictions of music.………………..….…211

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Works Cited…………………………………..…………………………………………….214

Works Consulted……………………………………………..……………………………..220

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

GPS: Das Glasperlenspiel

GW: Friedrich Nietzsche. Gesammelte Werke

Hesse: Novalis. Dokumente seines Lebens und Sterbens

Klein: “Klein und Wagner”

Klingsor: “Klingsors letzter Sommer”

KSA: Friedrich Nietzsche. Sämtliche Werke: Kritische Studienausgabe

Kurgast: Der Kurgast

Morgenlandfahrt: Die Morgenlandfahrt

Narziß: Narziß und Goldmund

SB: Friedrich Nietzsche. Sämtliche Briefe: Kritische Studienausgabe

Steppenwolf: Der Steppenwolf

Tragödie: Geburt der Tragödie

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INTRODUCTION

Hermann Hesse’s Romantic heritage

I. The popularity and “Tabuisierung” of Hesse’s works

Fame and reputation alone do not justify a scholarly investigation into a particular
author’s works, although it is difficult to ignore the fact that Hermann Hesse’s stories are so
popular that they have been translated into more than sixty languages, making him the most
widely translated German author of all time next to the Brothers Grimm (Limberg 128). This
in combination with the strong reader reactions, both positive and negative, to Hesse’s
multifarious novels and poems, along with the many prizes he has won over the years,
including the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946, does, however, begin to explain the
necessity of looking at his writings in more detail and combating the general “Tabuisierung
seitens der Germanistik” that has ensued with regard to this particular author since the mid-
1950s (Limberg 129). Additionally, the recent claim made by some scholars that Hesse’s
works – despite being heavily influenced by early German Romanticism – are still modern
and useful to their readers in answering existential life questions, makes it irresponsible not
to examine them more closely. Michael Limberg claims, “[w]er von der Literatur…Hilfe
und Antworten für das eigene Leben erwartet, wird nach wie vor [Hesses] Bücher lesen”
(135). I believe that the same holds true for German literary criticism. Scholars who seek
answers to questions raised with regard to 20th-century literature must explore Hesse’s
writing in more thematic and structural detail than has been done in the past. Furthermore,
any individual wanting to understand the development and eventual disappearance of
“absolute music” in German literature cannot neglect this renowned author’s writing. This
dissertation investigates the intersections between language and music in Hermann Hesse’s
masterpiece Das Glasperlenspiel and demonstrates that Hesse is the last great modern heir to
the early German Romantic legacy surrounding the concept of “absolute music.”

II. Romantic influences in Hesse’s writing

The connection between Hermann Hesse and early German Romanticism is a
relatively obvious one. Indeed, a large number of scholars have commented on the influence
of writers such as Novalis or Ludwig Tieck on the 20th-century author.1 Joseph Mileck notes
in his article “The Prose of Hermann Hesse: Life, Substance and Form” that romantic themes
can be found in nearly all of Hesse’s stories and poems. Mileck divides Hesse’s life work
into three periods and mentions the influence that various romantic ideas play in each of
these phases. He argues that works from the earliest period, from the beginning of Hesse’s
literary career until roughly 1917, are “held together primarily by a common, decadent
romantic spirit” (Prose 164). The famous author’s style becomes less romantic in some
stories from the following decade, although Hesse still writes tales such as “Klingsors letzter
Sommer,” which Mileck likens to “a romantic fragment” and describes as another instance of
“decadent romanticism” (Prose 168). Finally, Mileck argues that Hesse’s later works are
perhaps the most romantic of all. Mileck sees in them “a romantic spirit purged of its
decadence, becom[ing] mature and mellow, wider in scope, deeper in thought, less aware of

1 E.R. Curtius notes, for instance, that Hesse’s Narziß und Goldmund is “steeped in magical essences that recall
Arnim, Tieck, Novalis” (7-8); Thomas Mann more generally claims that Hesse’s “lifework [has] roots in native
German romanticism” (Bloom 22); Theodore Ziolkowski states, “Hesse is certainly an heir of romanticism”
(Sonata 122); and Hugo Ball describes Hesse as the “letzte Ritter aus dem glanzvollen Zuge der Romantik” (26-
27).
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