lott2302
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« on: June 27, 2008, 10:04:43 AM » |
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I'm a music scholar working on 19th-century music and am looking for important, influential, and/or fun novels from the period (c. 1820s to 1890s) to read this summer. I want to read things in English, but would like to branch out from Dickens and Austen.
Can you suggest good translations of continental authors? I'm thinking of French and German novelists, but any suggestions are welcome. (Would especially like a good translation of works by Jean-Paul Richter!)
Also, should I read _Middlemarch_ or _Daniel Deronda_? Does anyone have a suggestion for the best (or most accessible or summer-read-worthy) George Sand for me?
Thanks!
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hmaria1609
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« Reply #1 on: June 27, 2008, 11:03:25 AM » |
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Middlemarch is a chunk so it'll take you some time to read.
If you like mystery, you could give Wilkie Collins a go.
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« Last Edit: June 27, 2008, 11:04:06 AM by hmaria1609 »
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aandsdean
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« Reply #2 on: June 27, 2008, 11:19:42 AM » |
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Peter Gay has a lot of info on music in the trilogy, The Bourgeois Experience, Victoria to Freud, and also talks about a lot of fiction. It may be worth looking in the indices to those books for ideas.
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malcha
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« Reply #3 on: June 27, 2008, 12:04:26 PM » |
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This is my own perverse taste, but:
Charlotte Yonge, The Heir of Redclyffe.
It was very, very popular midcentury. The hero was the brooding Byronic hero rewritten as pious C of E. It includes some interesting sidelights on the combined idealization of music as an adjunct to spirituality and a very classist suspicion of an actual concert musician.
It is both sappy and religious.
It's not actually my favorite CM Yonge, though it is certainly the best known. I'm a bit obsessed with her.
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selkie
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« Reply #4 on: June 28, 2008, 01:14:48 PM » |
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Also, should I read _Middlemarch_ or _Daniel Deronda_?
You should read Daniel Deronda. After all, it features some professional musicians as characters. And, IMO, it's a livelier book than Middlemarch. |
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llanfair
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« Reply #5 on: June 28, 2008, 08:52:26 PM » |
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Black Beauty by Anna Sewall. Wonderful book.
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tenured_feminist
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« Reply #6 on: June 28, 2008, 09:02:44 PM » |
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I like Balzac and love Zola. Some people think I'm weird.
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You people are not fooling me. I know exactly what occurred in that thread, and I know exactly what you all are doing. |
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fiona
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« Reply #7 on: June 30, 2008, 02:38:06 AM » |
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There's music in Kate Chopin's _The Awakening_ and Willa Cather's _Song of the Lark_ (which may be 20th century).
For George Eliot (I think you mean George Eliot, not George Sand), I like _Mill on the Floss_ best.
Louisa May Alcott's sensational novels are fun, as are E. D. E. N Southworth's popular thrillers, esp. ones with Capitola in the title.
For French novels, Zola can be exciting. Compare his _Therese Raquin_ with Frank Norris's _McTeague_. Both are lurid, naturalistic, melodramatic, and funny in their overdone-ness. Norris also has a dentist who has a gift for giving pain.
The Fiona
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The Fiona or perhaps La Fiona
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The Right Reverend Fiona, PhD, Bishop of the Fora
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conjugate
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« Reply #8 on: June 30, 2008, 02:55:29 AM » |
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Well, I am a fan of Jules Verne; Arthur Conan Doyle; Alexander Dumas, père (the D'artagnan romances, in particular; I've never read The Vicomte de Bragelonne, the third of these, and never read (or even heard of) The Fencing Master. Then I was excited, while looking up the information I'm just babbling to you about, to discover that in 2005 his last novel, The Knight of Sainte-Hermine, was discovered. Look around for that. I think I might find that Vicomte dude, myself). I am so pleased at finding this I even changed the message icon.
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Unfortunately, I think conjugate gives good advice.
∀ε>0∃δ>0∋|x–a|<δ⇒|ƒ(x)-ƒ(a)|<ε |
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fiona
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« Reply #9 on: June 30, 2008, 02:58:52 AM » |
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Well, I am a fan of Jules Verne; Arthur Conan Doyle; Alexander Dumas, père (the D'artagnan romances, in particular; I've never read The Vicomte de Bragelonne, the third of these, and never read (or even heard of) The Fencing Master. Then I was excited, while looking up the information I'm just babbling to you about, to discover that in 2005 his last novel, The Knight of Sainte-Hermine, was discovered. Look around for that. I think I might find that Vicomte dude, myself). I am so pleased at finding this I even changed the message icon.
How do you change the message icon? The Fiona, who could look it up but prefers individual attention |
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The Fiona or perhaps La Fiona
Professor of Thread Killing, Fiork University
The Right Reverend Fiona, PhD, Bishop of the Fora
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conjugate
Compulsive punster and insatiable reader, and
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Tends to have warped sense of humor
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« Reply #10 on: June 30, 2008, 03:05:28 AM » |
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How do you change the message icon?
The Fiona, who could look it up but prefers individual attention
Darn, I thought you were going to congratulate me on my brilliance in finding out about the newly-discovered Dumas novel. Well, hit "reply," and look above the text box that you fill out the reply in. There are, of course, the buttons for boldface, italic, etc. Right above that is Message Icon: and a drop-down list. Drop down the list. I chose "Cheesy" for this message, not because I was anywhere near as happy as the little face, but because I just liked the sound of Cheesy. Sort of like one of the seven dwarfs. |
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Unfortunately, I think conjugate gives good advice.
∀ε>0∃δ>0∋|x–a|<δ⇒|ƒ(x)-ƒ(a)|<ε |
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tenured_feminist
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« Reply #11 on: June 30, 2008, 06:31:58 AM » |
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Yes, F, that's exactly it. I love Zola because I find him hilarious in the same way I find Upton Sinclair hilarious. Both would be mortally offended by my readership, I am sure.
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You people are not fooling me. I know exactly what occurred in that thread, and I know exactly what you all are doing. |
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mytiaraisaskew
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« Reply #12 on: June 30, 2008, 08:49:29 AM » |
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You might also check out the Victorian Web for inspiration: http://www.victorianweb.org/ |
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Fear my Righteous Scepter of Wrath! (with thanks to prof. viola)
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verbena
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« Reply #13 on: June 30, 2008, 04:31:54 PM » |
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I'm a big fan of the Pevear and Volokhonsky translations of Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov.
How about Eugene Onegin? Perfect for someone who works on 19thC music. The only translations I know are the Penguin Classics version and Nabokov's fabulously crazy version, but others might be able to recommend a better & more recent one.
Also, I'm convinced Thomas Mann is really a 19thC novelist, which is cheating but means you can read the John E. Woods translation of Doktor Faustus (yeah, okay, 1940s) and enjoy all the delectable Wagner/Schoenberg passages.
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"My kind of paper, into lots of fiber."
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fiona
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« Reply #14 on: June 30, 2008, 10:59:08 PM » |
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Cool! my message is now cheesy, too!
The Fiona La Fromage
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The Fiona or perhaps La Fiona
Professor of Thread Killing, Fiork University
The Right Reverend Fiona, PhD, Bishop of the Fora
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