Doctor Faustus (novel)
A modern Faustian tale of a composer's pact with the devil.
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His ambition for true greatness leads him to renounce love and bargain his soul for twenty-four years of genius.[1]
Making and release
Schoenberg was annoyed by this appropriation, and later editions included an Author's Note acknowledging the technique was his invention.[2] A 1949 publication by Mann detailed the novel's origins.[3] Mann received guidance from Theodor Adorno, who pushed for substantial revisions to the text.[2] To gauge audience reaction, Mann would present chapters to gatherings of invited listeners.[2]
The twelve-tone system, created by Arnold Schoenberg, is attributed to Leverkühn in Chapter XXII.[2] During the novel's composition, Schoenberg resided near Mann in Los Angeles.[2] The novel's title and subject matter are deeply connected to Goethe's two-part work Faust.[3]
What the cited sources add
Helen Lowe-Porter, the novel's first English translator, wrote that readers will be involved in three strands: the German scene, music as an instance of the arts, and the invocation of the daemonic.[4] Friedrich Nietzsche's biography served as a partial template for the arc of Leverkühn's life.[5] In The Birth of Tragedy (1871), Nietzsche argues that art's development is tied to the contrast between Apollonian and Dionysian forces.[5] Character names in the book are employed symbolically to mirror the journey of German culture from its medieval origins.[6]
References
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: The scene is strongly reminiscent of Ivan Karamazov's breakdown in Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov. (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Mann, "Doctor Faustus", Vintage International, 1999, p. 535 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Mann, Thomas. Die Entstehung des Doktor Faustus, Roman eines Romanes (S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1949): as The Story of a Novel: The Genesis of Doctor (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: T. Mann, Doctor Faustus, First England Edition (Secker and Warburg, London 1949), Translator's note, p. vi. (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: rendering '... die Fortentwickelung der Kunst an die Duplicität des Apollonischen und des Dionysischen gebunden ist': Nietzsche, Friedrich. Die Geburt der (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Doctor Faustus (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: H. Wölfflin, Principles of Art History 1915: Ch. 1, 'Architecture.; "Adolf Busch", Boydell & Brewer; Linick, "The Lives of Ingolf Dahl", AuthorHouse, 2008-09-17, p. 39 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Doctor Faustus (novel) (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Doctor Faustus (novel) (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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