Rebecca SC French 602F2576 MA in German Studies - Rhodes ...

so much the musical advance that was so evident in the Schönberg School, where the main focus
was the reconstruction of the musical language (Drew 1962: 90), but rather the interaction
between music and theatre. This calls to mind the Wagnerian ideal of the Gesamtkunstwerk,
where a theatrical production would include every aspect of the arts, from music, painting and
acting to poetry and prose, to create a total work of art.
Vienna, traditionally one of the hubs of culture – Mozart, Felix Salten (author of what Disney
turned into Bambi), Gustav Klimt, to mention but a few names associated with the city – and seat
of many of the progressive institutions of the time, is often the focal point for any study of
cultural advances of the time. Its legacy of musical activity and genius is particularly impressive
and pertinent to this research, in that it was the seat of the Schönberg School; however those
whom Drew (1969: 90f.) considers the era‟s masters of music, those whom he sees as having
exerted a positive influence on the next generation, were in fact German. Kurt Weill, Paul
Hindemith and Ernst Křenek 15 were all inspired by Brecht‟s idea of Gebrauchsmusik – music
written with a political or social purpose. Following Drew‟s criterion of exerting a positive
influence on the younger generation, Richard Strauss and Hans Pfitzner, two perhaps better-
known German composers of the time, do not rank as highly as the three mentioned above –
although Strauss was still widely admired, he was by then quite isolated and Pfitzner, with his
aggressively reactionary opinions, had lost much of the esteem won by his great 1917 opera
Palestrina, in which the theme of “das Problem der Inspiration” (Vaget 2006: 232) is explored.
Vaget goes as far as to say that of all the composers who played a role in Thomas Mann‟s life
and work, Pfitzner was by far the most enduringly influential. (Vaget 2006: 203) While Richard
Wagner and perhaps Gustav Mahler are generally more immediately identified as significant
influences in Mann‟s life and work, Vaget‟s comment about Pfitzner is not to be discredited,
considering that the theme of inspiration/ creation and the difficulties surrounding it is one that
has come to be so closely associated with Mann. Incidentally, an ironic turn of events was the
fact that Pfitzner was rumoured to be vehemently opposed to Thomas Mann and his ideas, which
Vaget suggests was possibly due to Pfitzner‟s own initial complicity with National Socialism and
subsequent „guilty conscience‟, rather than any actual antipathy towards Mann. (Vaget 2001:
16f.)
15 Weill is best known for his collaborations with Bertolt Brecht, in particular the 1928 Dreigroschenoper;
Hindemith for his neoclassical explorations of dissonance, strongly reminiscent of Bach in their contrapuntal
complexity. Křenek was born in Vienna, but had no desire to return to Austria after his studies. His opera, Karl V
(1931-1933), is written entirely in the 12-tone mode of Schönberg. All three composers fled Nazi persecution and
moved to the USA, where, with the exception of Hindemith, they spent the rest of their lives.
15