Narrative strategies in Schubert's settings of Schiller texts
Date
1994
Authors
Padmanabhan, Mekala
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Abstract
Franz Schubert's musical settings of Schiller texts have received little scholarly attention, although they form the second largest number of texts by a single poet that the composer chose to set. Due to the absence of substantial documentation about Schubert's views on Schiller's poetry and his mus1cal-narrat1ve procedures, Schubert's compositional approach to these texts cannot be easily ascertained. A brief survey of O.E. Deutsch's Thematic Catalogue reveals that nearly one hundred of Schubert's songs exist in multiple versions. Twenty out of the thirty-two Schiller poems were set to music more than once by Schubert, but have been largely ignored in Lieder literature.
This study investigates Schubert's musical treatment of the poetry of Friedrich von Schiller and the composer's reworking of the Schiller settings. The thesis is divided into three chapters. Chapter I examines Schubert's cultural orientation - in particular, the literary and musical influences- which might have triggered his affinity for Schiller poems. Chapter II, which is an analytical study of selected Schiller settings, illustrates that the narrative strategies employed by Schubert were dictated by the internal and external attributes of Schiller's poetic framework. The final chapter provides a comparative assessment of the multiple settings discussed and gives insight into Schubert's changing approach to Schiller texts throughout his compositional career.