A Deleuzian and Guattarian Reading of Robert Schumann’s Instrumental Variations
2022-08
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A Deleuzian and Guattarian Reading of Robert Schumann’s Instrumental Variations
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2022-08
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Robert Schumann’s handling of the variation form—for which Brahms coined the term “fantasy variations”—bears witness to his idiosyncratic approach to the form’s cyclical and recursive nature, a process via which the emphasis is not on the return of the same (the embellishment of the theme) but the generation of new materials and expressive states. This “digressive” variational trajectory is epitomized by a contrasting finale variation that stands as the affective antithesis to the opening theme, instead of, as typical in many Classical variation sets, restating the theme at the end as a recapitulation. Drawing on Gilles Deleuze’s ontology of difference and transcendental empiricism, and his later works on territorialization and stratification in collaboration with Félix Guattari, Schumann’s aesthetics of variations can be brought into relief through their philosophical lenses, which deem identities as emergent from, and contingent upon, a more fundamental field of empirical difference. When viewed along the same vein as Deleuze’s personal take on Nietzsche’s idea of eternal recurrence, variations as a cyclical process, is no longer considered as a return of the original theme (as an identity) but a reappearance of the entire field of difference that opens up to the immanent flows of the chaosmos, which is differentiated in each individuated variation as a singular event. An overview of the existing scholarly literature on variations, Schumann, and Deleuze is offered in Part 1 (Chapter 1 to 4) of this dissertation. I will present two detailed analyses of two of Schumann’s compositions in variation form—Études symphoniques, Op. 13 and Adagio and Variations, WoO 10—based on Deleuze’s philosophical concepts and ontological perspective. With regard to the former (Part 2, Chapter 5 and 6), the piece is revealed to suggest a rhizomatic network of motivic interrelations that brings together the variations in the form of a constellation. Part 3 (Chapter 7 to 9) of my dissertation examines the interplay of different temporalities within the second piece, giving rise to a rhizomatic time or what Deleuze calls a “crystal of time.” The final chapter (Chapter 10) places Schumann’s individual approach to variations in a broader context: how it offers a different conception of musical form (a dispersive process), as well as how it correlates with Romantic ideas of the fragment, the infinite, and sublime beauty in the writings of Jean Paul, Schlegel, and Novalis.
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University of Minnesota Ph.D. dissertation. August 2022. Major: Music. Advisors: Sumanth Gopinath, Matthew Bribitzer-Stull. 1 computer file (PDF); ii, 544 pages.
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Lo, Kai Yin. (2022). A Deleuzian and Guattarian Reading of Robert Schumann’s Instrumental Variations. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/243153.
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