Suschitzky 398 448

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

1/51
http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/http://mq.oxfordjournals.org/

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

2/51

bardment of Paris began. During his last days he listened to the lugubrioussound of the explosions, and his suffering ceased on Monday 25 March.5

Laloys account has the force of melodrama. Debussys death andRameaus resurrection are connected by more than coincidence: themingled sounds of German bombardment, Rameaus music, and De-bussys sotto voce farewell to his hero signal a real and symbolic connec-tion. Laloy may adopt the language of hagiography, yet his scene pointsto an image of succession and revival cherished by Debussy himself.Composer and musicologist met in the wake of the controversy sur-roundingPellas et Mlisandein 1902, which caused an important debate

about Debussys relationship to Wagner.6

Their friendship, whichmarked the end of Debussys intimacy with the Wagnerian Pierre Loys,was cemented by Laloys support for Debussys music and by a commoninterest in Rameau.7Many reviews ofPellasexonerated Debussy of tiesto Wagner and romanticism and praised the originality of the musicaland declamatory style. But as a champion of Rameau, Laloy was unri-valed in Debussys circle, and he became an obvious ally in 1903 when,as we shall see, Debussy launched a campaign to revise common percep-tions of music history, reject the influence of German music, and estab-lish his own kinship with Rameau.

Laloy supported Debussys position to the last. Even his obituary,published on 30 March 1918, was combined with a review ofCastor.He celebrated the production as a memorable victory for French tastein which the greatest musician of old France was resurrected andrestored to glory amidst the ruins of war and bloodshed. And hesolemnized Debussy, the most worthy successor, who prolongedRameaus tradition and enriched it with modern sensibilities.8Laloysmemories again appear to mingle fantasy and biography, histories bothreal and possibly imagined. But if they were fantasy, they were Debussys

fantasies too. A lthough Debussys activity as a critic had only been inter-mittent, his essays paid particular attention to Rameau. He had alsogiven enthusiastic accolades in interviews and letters to friends and col-leagues. It is abundantly clear from his writings that Rameau was his fa-vorite symbol of French music and his chosen foundation for a nationaltradition differentiated from Germany.9Thus, according to Laloys ac-count of Debussys historical imagination, Rameau and Debussy emergephoenixlike from the ruins to serve a monolithic national style. The twocomposers are indissolubly linked: Rameau finds continuance in Debussy

just as Debussy remains present in a revived Rameau.

Embellishments, omissions, and other distortions of memory revealthe impact of the present on perceptions of the past; they also give life

Debussys Rameau 399

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

3/51

to hope for the future as they transmit their ideals to successive genera-tions. Thus, while Laloys memories attest to this suggestiveness in De-

bussys ancestral claim, they also serve as a reminder that Debussys ownunderstanding of his place in history influences our perceptions of hisachievement. If we want to understand Debussys relation to the Frenchtradition as well as the public persona that arises from it, we must con-front his insistent bid for kinship. This article attempts that confronta-tion. In taking Debussys position seriously, I want to consider the signif-icance of his criticism in our assessment of his music and aestheticposition, and the importance of his historical imagination in his visionof modern music. Though in different ways from Laloy, I too want to

suggest that by looking at Debussys public persona within the Frenchtradition, we may come closer to understanding the controversial andambivalent nature of his national identity.

My interest in Debussys essays is hardly new. Some have minimizedhis concern for the past: Edward Lockspeiser insisted that the composersfriends were the impetus behind the writings on Rameau. FranoisLesure went further, claiming that Debussys alliance with Rameau, aposition of principle that had no coherent relationship with the majorityof his opinions, was merely designed to secure allies after the premiereofPellas.10At the opposite extreme, Debussys essays have been taken as

a gloss on archaic features in his music: Dieter Winzer finds Rameauspresence in almost every aspect of Debussys music, from periodic struc-tures and bass progressions to melodic shapes, declamation, and har-mony.11But the ubiquity of such evidence ultimately weakens the argu-ment. A third group of scholars has suggested that tensions betweenDebussys critical output and his music reveal a more complex attitudetoward French cultural identity. Scott Messing finds the origin of De-bussys archaic musical style not in Rameau but in recent music dans lestyle ancien by Erik Satie, Camille Saint-Sans, and Lo Dlibes; this

helpfully places Debussy within a broader context of early moves towardneoclassicism.12And although Michael Downes and Jrg Stenzl do notdiscuss Debussys music at length, they rightly suggest that his theoriesabout national identity emanated from deep ambivalence toward Ger-man styles, particularly that of Richard Wagner.13

The most sustained discussion of these issues is Jane Fulchers ex-amination of Debussys position in its political context. Fulcher beginswith critics ofPellas, who alleged that Debussys declamatory style de-rived from Rameau. She argues forcefully that as this stylistic connectiondrew support from critics on the Right and the Left, so Debussy learned

to manipulate public debate in the hope of rescuing himself from themargins of the musical and social world.14 I agree with Fulchers sugges-tion that the essays on Rameau bear the traces of Debussys emerging

400 The Musical Quarterly

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

4/51

public voice, which he found in a dialogue with critics of Pellas;this di-alogue drew him into a broader debate about French cultural identity,

through which he refined his self-understanding in relation to questionsof nationalism, classicism, and antiromanticism.15But her treatment ofpossible connections between Debussys criticism and his music containsunresolved contradictions. She claims that the text setting in Pellasemulated Rameau.16But she also insists that Debussys position onRameau had little to do with his music, and that Debussy, the most sub-tle of artists, found it impossible to be doctrinaire in his art.17Giventhat she also identifies Debussy as a political thinker who was sympa-thetic, ultimately, with the far Right, her treatment of this paradox could

be interpreted as an attempt to rescue good music from bad politics.18

But there are other reasons for separating Debussys music fromhis prose. It is notoriously difficult to make direct correlations betweena composers theory and practice, or, conversely, to draw definite conclu-sions from the absence of such proximity. In this essay, therefore, I willnot discuss DebussysHommage Rameau(from Imagesfor piano, 1905).19

The personas that take shape in Debussys essays seem to differ in kindand significance from the identities that populate his music; indeed, con-nections between prose and music, where they exist, may not be at thelevel of detail, stylistic features or ideas, but may be more general and

perhaps doubly and even deliberately elusive.20My question is not whether Debussys interest in the past was

political (in the sense of political organization), nor whether Rameaudirectly or perceptibly influencedPellasand later works. This article isless about the real or purported links between ancient and modern com-posers than about Debussys effort to construct his own and his nationshistory and his relationship to contemporary historiography and culturesof revival. I will address two questions: how did Rameau become a cen-tral preoccupation of Debussys historical imagination; and how did De-

bussy understand himself in relation to contemporary ideas of Frenchhistory? I will first place Debussys essays about Rameaus operas in a newintellectual and cultural context; I will then discuss Debussys contribu-tion to an edition of Rameaus Les ftes de Polymnie, which has not yetreceived adequate attention.

Pursuing the Past

In 1903 Debussy attended a performance of the first two acts of Rameaus

Castor et Polluxat the Schola Cantorum.21 It changed his views onFrench music. Immediately afterward he published an essay inGil Blasin which he held up Rameau as the paragon of the French style: In

Debussys Rameau 401

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

5/51

Rameaus oeuvre we find the pure French tradition: delicate and charm-ing tenderness, correct accentuation and rigorous declamation in the

recitatives, without that German affectation of profundity, without theneed to underline . . . or explain everything.22Debussy acknowledgedthat Rameau had been superseded by Christoph Willibald Gluck. Buthe saw Rameau as the last harbinger of a truly French music, celebratedfor its luminosity, elegance, clear expression, [and] precise and com-pact form.23Closing the stylistic and linguistic chasms that separatedhis own work from that of Rameau, Debussy concluded that, inCastor,the Spartans cry like you and me; Tlares air is a translation of thegentle and profound mourning of a woman in love; and the monologue

air of Pollux . . . [is] so personal in tone, so new in construction, thatspace and time are defeated and Rameau seems to be [our] contempo-rary.24His review ended evangelically: I hope to be forgiven for writingso much. . . . My first excuse is Rameau, who is worth it; my second isthat times of real joy are rare in life and I didnt want to keep them tomyself.25

Three weeks later, Debussy published an open letter to Gluck, la-beling him a composer of spectacle, luxury, and ceremony, who inaugu-rated the French fashion for the lugubrious word setting and heavy or-chestration that led to romanticism. Condescending to instruct Gluck in

that manner of text setting in which, again, he located a central charac-teristic of French identity, Debussy quipped: Just between the two of us,you set words really badly; at the very least you make French into anaccentuated language when it is in fact a nuanced one. (I know . . . youare German).26This gibe should not mask the seriousness of Debussysclaim, which was an attack on Glucks ideological associations. Accord-ing to Debussy, Gluck was a court musician and would never have suc-ceeded in France without the intervention of an Austrian, Marie An-toinette. By vociferously promoting Rameaus revival, Debussy hoped a

century of aberrant compositional behavior would be curtailed and for-eign styles expelled. In this context, Rameau was more French than hissuccessors. Debussy hailed him as the originator of the modern nationsmusic, and, condemning Glucks claims to the French classical heritageas btises, he concluded, Rameau was infinitely more Greek thanyou.27

By emphasizing Rameaus Greek restraint and comparing it toGlucks Germanic grandeur, Debussy was drawing on a critical common-place, according to which French writers had long cherished the so-called classical rationality, lightness, and elegance of their native style.28

Ideas about classicism began as claims for Frances links to Greek antiq-uity, republicanism, and universality; but, as Zeev Sternhell has shown,


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

6/51

in the 1880s and 1890s they became part of a narrower definition of theFrench nation based on blood, soil, and race.29Fulcher places Debussys

statements on the French tradition within yet another manifestation ofthe classical ideal, which emerged just before the war as a preoccupationwith specifically Latin virtues, such as purity, proportion, order, andanti-individualism. Again she finds his musicthis time the late worksat odds with his theoretical ideals.30But although Debussys wartimeessays attest to patriotic feelings sharpened by external circumstances,his statements in the early 1900s suggest that his preoccupation with na-tional identity was nurtured for other, more long-standing reasons.

Beneath his veneer of optimism, Debussy harbored secret fears,

which were arguably the most important motivation for his interest inthe past. Thanks to you, he continued in his fantasy conversation withGluck, French music enjoyed the unexpected benefit of falling into thearms of Wagner; I like to imagine that, without you, this would not havehappened, and, furthermore, French music would not have sought theway to its future in the work of the very composers who most longed tosee it disappear.31Debussy returned obsessively to the corruption ofFrench taste from the French Revolution to the present.32And as his at-tacks on Gluck modulated into vitriol against Wagner, so their modernrelevance was revealed. By casting Wagner as Rameaus nemesis, and

Rameau, in turn, as a panacea against Wagnerism, Debussy made thecase for his own music as the embodiment of a renewed French tradition.

As is well known, Debussy had struggled to minimize Wagnersinfluence in his own music, the greatest challenge being Pellas, whosenevertheless Wagnerian style was debated well into the 1900s.33Mean-while, Wagners music dramas had since the 1890s become associatedwith the most progressive styles and were a permanent fixture in therepertory.34This created a crisis: a conflict between audiences whowanted to hear Wagner and composers who wanted to forge a distinct

French identity. Debussy was hit directly. The launch ofPellaswasovershadowed by a performance ofGtterdmmerungin May 1902, andalthough Debussys work enjoyed support from the Parisian avant-garde,it was by no means the most popular work at the Opra-Comique in itstime.35Debussy was beset by financial difficulties.36His job as a musiccritic took him to London in 1903 to review the Ringat Covent Garden,and, like many French composers, he was caught between admirationand fear.37But whereas some argued for an assimilation of Wagnersideas and saw no contradiction in performing Gluck, Debussys proposedsolution was more radical.

At the premiere ofPellas, Debussy had asserted that, rather thandestroying melody, his anti-Wagnerian style was an evocative language

Debussys Rameau 403

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

7/51

that restored a forgotten sense of beauty and declamation; the orches-tra provided the dcor and the characters tried to sing like real peo-

ple.38Most important, he had summoned the notion of succession andclaimed that inPellashe divined a way to comeafterWagner, but notto followWagner.39But only after seeingCastorin 1903 did he reassertthe historical and stylistic tradition as well as the cultural and ideologi-cal context that would serve, albeit retrospectively, as a compellingprecedent for his work. His claim of kinship with Rameau should there-fore be understood as a continuation of his exegesis of Pellas. By secur-ing his place at the head of an emergent living history, Debussy couldclaim to have come afterWagner by, as it were, comingbeforehim.

As with so many acts of revival, it was less the adored object of the pastthan a feared contemporary presence that impelled fanatical claims ofkinship with long-dead composers.

Debussys self-interest was served in a wider sphere too. His rela-tionship to Rameau brought him into contact with a broader trend of re-vival, which opposed the Revolution, the Enlightenment, individualism,and other preromantic ideals, but with an important corollary: renewedfascination with the ancien rgime. This conservative interest in historywas encouraged by the Third Republic, which negotiated compromisesbetween new civic elites and old political factions while also encourag-

ing reassessments of the prerevolutionary period by scholars and teach-ers; by the 1900s, a broad classical revival drew support from most cir-cles.40As Philip Nord has shown, ralliementand the sense of continuitybetween past and present built consumer loyalty, supported French busi-ness, boosted workers morale, and invigorated education; republicaninstitutions emerged not from a revolutionary rejection of the old orderand its supporters, but from an alignment of various political groupsand a recovery of self-confidence on the part of Frances conservativeelites.41Debussy participated in this recovery. His characterization of

Rameau and Gluck emphasized rifts between early- and late-eighteenth-century aesthetics and national identity; and, as we shall see, he alsoplaced Rameau alongside other cultural figures of the ancien rgime.

This is not to deny the importance of politics in Debussys work. Rather,it suggests that by participating in the nonrevolutionary spirit of somecontemporary thinking, he found a compelling alternative to Wagneriannationalism and German influence and contributed to a striking revisionof French cultural history, which imagined a modern national identity inharmony with a recuperated prerevolutionary past.

Debussys second experience of a staged performance of Rameautook place only four months after he sawCastor. This time, the Schola


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

8/51

offered an open-air performance of RameausLa guir lande(1753).42Thiswas a shortacte de ballet, a genre invented during the eighteenth century

that satisfied tastes for spectacle and light comedy. Rather than classicaltragedy,La guir landedrew on thebergerie:a simple tale of love lost andregained in a world of shepherds, shepherdesses, birds, flowers, andmeadows. On this occasion Debussy reputedly uttered his famous cri deguerreVive Rameau! bas Gluck!43But in an essay he recommendedthat the Opra-Comique perform another comedy: the opra-ballet LesIndes galantes(1735, rev. 1736).

Like La guir lande, Les Indesconcerns amorous intrigues in aneighteenth-century setting, but there are four acts, each one featuring a

different exotic location: Turkey, Peru, Persia, and a North Americanforest. Les Indesexplores the possibility of a universal human naturewhose cultural differentiation is revealed by love and nature in myriadforms, and it includes spectacular passages of musical pictoralism, suchas storms, an earthquake, and a volcano, as well as a more civilized na-ture in the form of gardens and flowers.44While Debussys comments onthe work again emphasized the elegance of Rameaus style, his principalargument drew on a comparison with another artist of the period:

[Rameau] suffered much the same fate as Watteau. He died and the years

went by in a silence organized by colleagues who knew full well what theywere doing. Now, the name of Watteau is illuminated by a glorious sun,and no period of painting can overshadow the greatest and most movinggenius of the eighteenth century. In Rameau we have the perfect counter-part to Watteau. Is it not time we gave him the place he alone deserves,instead of obliging French music to rely on heavy cosmopolitan traditionsthat inhibit its genius from developing freely?45

Debussys comparison is not simply a statement about the similar fates oftwo ancien rgime artists, rejected under the austere classical aesthetic

and extreme political ideologies of the Revolution.46

Nor is it merely acall for their revival in the name of future artistic regeneration. As anexamination of Antoine Watteau (16841721) and his reception at thefin de sicle will show, Debussys argument reveals his sensitivity to abroader debate about the nations history and future.

After the death of Louis XIV, the French aristocracy migrated fromVersailles. Philippe dOrlans and Louis XV moved to Paris, and, criticiz-ing the grand gotand ceremony of earlier regimes, cultivated private en-tertainments, grce, and playfulness. The nobility also explored socialfreedoms associated with urban life, particularly popular theater.47One

of their keenest observers was Watteau.48His ftes galanteswere symbolicrepresentations of the elites, who rejected seventeenth-century classicism

Debussys Rameau 405

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

9/51

and imagined their leisure in theatrical terms. As Thomas Crow ex-plains, Parisian aristocratic life . . . evolved into an intensely personal

theatre of social and erotic intrigue,49which was played out in the dec-orative interiors of the new rococo htelsandpetites maisons, and in thepleasure gardens of their estates, where music and theater explored newidentities and social freedoms.

The Italian commedia dellarte, expelled by Louis XIV and restoredby his more liberal successors, resembled the modern leisure activities ofthe aristocracy: both mixed high and low art and explored truththrough masks and disguise.50And as Michael Levey has shown, Wat-teau employed images from the commedia when he renounced the play-

ful surfaces of rococo art for a more serious view of human nature in theftes.51For example, a group of comedians rehearse a song in the back-ground ofVoulez-vous triompher des belles?(Fig. 1). But Watteau drawsour attention to the foreground, where a serious scene of lovemaking un-folds between a masked man and a woman in colored silk. Harlequin ishere transformed from street entertainer to rococo suitor, his mask sym-bolizing his social freedom; he reaches out to draw Columbine into thedark undergrowth; and their emotional engagement is staged beneathan austere classical statue, which is turned away, perhaps suggesting theserious and enduring aspects of their interaction.52Watteaus emotion-

ally charged juxtaposition of symbols was new; and his preference forpopular entertainment (rather than aristocratic patronage and royalinstitutions) suggested his role in a growing public sphere for art. Heharnessed a courtly style to a critique of the court, and as he subvertedclassical order, he explored modern conditionsinteriority, expressive-ness, privacy, and individualism.53

Debussys fascination with rococo art is evident from his charac-terization of music and passion inCastor, and from his enthusiasm forRameaus comedies, which focus on love and disguise in exotic and

natural locations. His comparison between Rameau and Watteau sug-gests that he saw them as modern artists, similarly placed to break withseventeenth-century styles and develop new ideas about human expres-sion and nature.54But Debussys attention to this particular moment inthe eighteenth century was also an intensification of earlier interests.As is well known, in the late 1880s and early 1890s he composed songsabout the commedia dellarte and used eighteenth-century styles inpieces for the piano.55At the same time, he cultivated a taste foreighteenth-century painting. In Italy in 1882 he met Count GiuseppePrimoli, owner of a large collection of Watteaus works; Primoli invited

him to compose at his house at Fiumicino.56On his return to Paris,Debussy encountered a city in the grip of a rococo revival. Since the


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

10/51

Goncourt brothers had published their essays on eighteenth-century artin 1856, Watteau had been associated with charm, grace, and elegance,and was held as the epitome of ancien rgime painting and the galantespirit.57But while the Goncourts (and later Grard de Nerval and

Thodore de Banville) emphasized Watteaus proto-romantic melan-choly and the centrality of the painters fantasy and imagination in the

Debussys Rameau 407

Figure 1. Watteau,Voulez-vous triompher des belles?(Harlequin and Columbine). Repro-duced by permission of the Trustees of the Wallace Collection.

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

11/51

ftes, 58fin-de-sicle critics and artists also began to see in the rococo aconnection between interiority, nature, and privacy on the one hand,

and modernity and nationhood on the other. They cherished this con-nection in their own culture too.59Debora Silverman has shown that itwas first explored in the 1880s and 1890s, when the rococo interiors ofthe Bibliothque Nationale and the palace at Versailles were restored,and when the collection of rococo painting, design, and furniture at theLouvre was expanded. Interest in ancien rgime art and design not onlyencouraged widespread exploration of the expressive possibilities of a re-vived early-eighteenth-century aesthetic. It also helped foster a renewedawareness of national history. Thus, by 1900, what began during the

Second Empire as an antiquarian interest in ancien rgime art and fash-ion had contributed to an important shift in modern art and nationalidentity: art nouveau was born.60

Members of the most important organizations associated with artnouveauthe National Society of Beaux-Arts and the Central Union ofthe Decorative Artslooked to Watteaus paintings as a source for theaffinity between nationhood and interiority.61But the most importantsymbol of this ideal was the arabesque, a principle of rococo design,which Watteau implemented in ceilings, tapestries, fans, bookplates,musical instruments, and even coach doors. He inherited it from Grard

Audran, decorator of the grandest rococo residences of the time; but, asDonald Posner points out, Watteau (unlike Audran) experimented withasymmetrical shapes and imaginative naturalistic imagery. Indeed, hisarabesques popularized the ftes galantesby combining genre scenes(vignettes from the theater or pastoral scenes in old-fashioned costume)with elements of fantasy (decorative borders of foliage, trellis work,scrolls, and other symbols).62For example, in Lescarpolette(Fig. 2), asCrow explains, the central vignettea couple in formal stage clothesmerges with its frame by means of a path on which are strewn discarded

props: symbols of lust, including bagpipes, a hat, and an overflowingbasket of flowers. This path is linked to a bridge, which merges withan outer border, decorated with classical symbols of pleasure.63Classicaland modern are thus combined in a work that functions simultaneouslyas stage, garden, and pastoral fantasy, and that creates a work of and forthe imagination.64

Art nouveau revived the arabesque in numerous forms;65some ofthese originated in direct association with Rameau. Perhaps the mostprominent was for the first fully staged revival of a work by Rameau atthe Paris Opra. A poster (Fig. 3) made in 1908 to publicize a produc-

tion of the tragedyH ippolyte et A ricie(1733, rev. 1742) was based on aneighteenth-century arabesque that showed a central vignette (Hippolytein a garden, lifted up by zephyrs and waved off by Diane and Aricie)


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

12/51

merging with a frame (an arch with female sculptures) by means of trees.The outer border, added in 1908, borrowed eighteenth-century symbols(bagpipes, flowers, and fruits) but neutralized their bawdy associations bymeans of a decorative flat frame; the space between the two frames em-

phasizes the distance between modern pastiche and original design. TheOpras next production,Castorin 1918, also used an arabesque on theticket and the libretto.

Debussys Rameau 409

Figure 2. After Watteau,Lescarpolete(The Swing), etched by L. Crespy. The Metropoli-tan Museum of Art, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Herbert N. Straus, 1928. (28.113 vol. III, pl. 61)Photograph, all rights reserved, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

13/51

Much before this, the Scholas performance of La guir landein 1903drew on Watteaus symbolic economy in its placement of the stage inrelation to the orchestra, audience, and surroundings. Figure 4 is a pho-tograph of the event, showing how the garden was an arabesque-like

frame that merged with the foliage and trellises on stage. Two statuesof masked theatrical figures mark the boundaries of the platform. But as


Figure 3. H ippolyte et A ricie, Opra 1908, Courtesy of the Bibliothque Nationale deFrance, Paris.

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

14/51

they seem to emerge from the foliage and turn toward the actors, so likespectators, they too blur the boundaries between actor and audience,

stage and offstage. In the center, singers stand on either side of a classicalstatue adorned with flowers; they reflect the pose of the statues but lookout at the audience, as if to highlight the artificiality of their perfor-mance. The orchestra is placed in the garden and functions as a bridgebetween performers and spectators. The audience is thus absorbed into arococo conceit, placed, like the stage, in a world that merges past andpresent, reality and theater, self-consciousness and imagination.

I have deliberately described these images in terms borrowed fromscholars of Watteau. But the connection was also noted in 1903. Co-

lette, Debussys colleague onGil Blas, reacted in an extremely positiveway. A week beforeLa guir landeshe wrote that she planned to wear herPompadour dress and ftes galantes soul.66And in an essay afterward,she reveled in the nervous tickle produced by a dais embellished withgarlands, a copse lined with trellises, and candles moved by a nocturnalbreeze . . . or the wing of a little soul from the past, alarmed and ravishedto recognize this music, which has aged without paling.67ColettesClaudineseries had recently triumphed among readers, theater audi-ences, and fashion enthusiasts; she would later inaugurate her stage ca-reer in a garden where she participated in an amorous pastoral play and

in Maurice MaeterlincksPellas(the latter in drag).68No wonder sherelished a fte galantein the urban landscape of cosmopolitan Paris.

Debussys Rameau 411

Figure 4. La guirlande, Schola Cantorum 1903, Courtesy of the Bibliothque Nationalede France, Paris.

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

15/51

Debussys comparison betweenLes Indesand Watteau was probablyinspired by the same visual stimulus. But antique conceits again seemed

to complement his former predilections. Aside from songs and pianomusic on commedia themes in the late 1880s, hisDeux arabesques(188891) for piano borrowed the sinuous and decorative shapes of Wat-teaus verdant scenes;69and he dabbled in an orchestral accompanimentto a poem by Gabriel Mourey (an important theorist of art nouveau)with the titleLembarquement pour ailleurs, a clear reference to Watteausmost famous painting,Lembarquement de Cythre.70Debussy even col-lected art nouveau.71But just as we saw that after 1903 he sharpened hisrhetoric in relation to French declamation and a musical tradition of

grace, restraint, and naturalness, so the same year was a turning point inhis understanding of other eighteenth-century arts and aesthetics: after1903 Watteau and the culture he had come to represent became figuresin Debussys historical imagination.

Debussys comparison between Watteau and Rameau included theclaim that Rameau was almost a young composer, andLes Indeswasso gracefully French.72He assimilated the Watteauesque notion ofpleasure to a description of the French style: French music is clarity, el-egance, [and] simple and natural declamation; French music above allwants togive pleasure.73And his interest in ancien rgime culture inten-

sified to such a degree that he planned to compose new music accordingto this particular image of the past. In 1909 he lamented the decline ofprerevolutionary listening habits, which were attuned to the perfecttaste, strict elegance, and absolute beauty of Rameaus style.74Hebegan to collaborate with Laloy on a ballet for Serge Diaghilev entitledMasques et bergamasques. He was so impatient to begin that he producedhis own comic scenario, set in eighteenth-century Venice.75Later theyworked on anopra-ballet, eventually calledFtes galantes. Laloys open-ing tableau, Les masques, was set in a Watteauesque garden on a late

summer afternoon; two other sections, Les rves and La vrit, de-veloped the commedia dellarte theme. The link between Watteau,Rameau, and Debussy was to be celebrated in a ballet whose literarysource was a modern evocation of a lost utopia, and whose music was amodern-day stylization of a French operatic tradition.76

Finally, Debussys view of Rameau developed alongside scholarlyinterest in the eighteenth century. The influential literary historian Gus-tave Lanson (18571934), for example, described the theater during theRegency and Louis XV as the precedent for modern culture.77He wasparticularly attracted to the secularism and rationalism of this period,

which he compared favorably to the religious and monarchical characterof seventeenth-century art; he celebrated eighteenth-centuryplays for


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

16/51

being classical without association with the king or monarchicalpageantry.78He repeatedly emphasized rational values, which, he

claimed, made prerevolutionary writers contemporary.79And he insistedthat eighteenth-century masterpieces are in front of us, not as archivaldocuments, fossil-like, dead and cold, and without relation to life today;but . . . still active and living, capable of making an impression on soulsof our time.80

Like Lanson, Debussy used Rameau as a fulcrum around whichnarratives about pre- and postrevolutionary French music could be re-arranged according to a new agenda. His essay onCastormade similarclaims about the proximity of ancient and modern music. Moreover, in

a preview of the Opras production ofH ippolyte, in which he renewedhis attack on Gluck, Marie Antoinette, and Wagner (and this timeadded Giacomo Meyerbeer to the firing line), he redoubled his claimabout Rameaus timeless qualities. Debussy proposedHippolyteas an ex-ample for modern composers wanting to imitate nature, avoid gratuitousspectacle, eliminate frenetic German orchestration, resurrect correctdeclamation, and maintain French expressiveness in modern music.81

He also explored the ideological connotations of rococo art by under-lining Rameaus separation from the official institutions of his time.Hippolytewas first performed at the Parisian house of the fermier gnrale

Le Riche de la Pouplinire, one of the wealthiest men in France andRameaus employer for many years. So in his preview Debussy stressedLa Pouplinires role in introducing Rameau to his librettist, Abb Pelle-grin, and in launching his works into the commercial world of Parisopera. Having established Rameaus credentials as a modern composerin the new marketplace, he then focused on those aspects of the dramathat matched the historical imagination of his contemporaries: ratherthan emphasize remnants of Racines tragedy, he stressed the luminosityof the orchestration and the divertissementsand pastoral characters: the

shepherds . . . choruses of priestesses . . . hunters, and all sorts of musicalinterludes in which Rameau was able to show off his prodigious powersof invention.82

This publicity complemented the Opras arabesque (Fig. 3) bypresenting Rameau in yet another way as the perfect counterpart toWatteau. And like Lansons project, it placed ancien rgime culture ina milieu as close as possible to that of modern times. Perhaps Debussysown unorthodox attitude toward state institutions and traditional musi-cal training motivated these and later attempts to close the gulf betweenpast and present.83 In 1912, he stressed Rameaus difficulties with in-

competent and uncomprehending musicians and singers; he praisedRameaus discovery of harmonic moments to caress the ear and his

Debussys Rameau 413

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

17/51

obsessive need to understand and provide a rational basis for his music;and he celebrated his exploration of sensibility within harmony . . .

[and] certain colors, certain nuances that musicians before him had notproperly understood.84By extending links between his image of Rameauand a network of fashionable French artists, historians, and theorists,Debussy adopted the terms of a popular engagement with ancien rgimeculture, which cut across political differences and located a common ori-gin for the French nation. Debussys historical imagination masked for-eign elements in his music and supported a nationalist aesthetic radicallydifferent from Wagners. But his public persona also created competitiveadvantages for a composer in a modern marketplace that was increas-

ingly concerned with its roots in the prerevolutionary era.

Playing with Polymnie

In 1908, Debussy publicized his connection with Rameau in a newway: his name appeared as editor ofLes ftes de Polymniein the RameauOeuvres compltes.85The series, the first of its kind in France, alreadycounted among its editors prestigious composers such as Camille Saint-Sans, Vincent dIndy, and Paul Dukas. And the authority of the project

was enhanced in introductions to each volume by Charles Malherbe,archivist of the Paris Opra, who described in detail the original perfor-mances and critical reception. TheOeuvres compltesoffered the re-newed possibility of fully staged productions. It was an encyclopedicmonument to Rameau and the most lasting testimony of his modernrevival.86

The guiding claim of the edition, stated in the introduction toPolymnie, was to restore the initial thinking of the author and to give,if possible, the version that was used at the first performance of the

work.87

By joining the project Debussy accepted this ideal. But the ap-paratus of scholarly objectivity did not tell the whole story. Many con-tributors were friends of the publisher Jacques Durand and had no first-hand knowledge of musicology.88While each volume bore the name of acelebrity editor, the most strident claims of authenticity were madeanonymously in introductions signed by the editorial board. Even de-tailed critical notes and cumbersome appendices did not fully acknowl-edge the difficulty of restoring Rameaus original.

Debussys editorial role remains particularly mysterious. Lon Val-lass picture was of a composer humiliated by the scholarly enterprise and

driven to it only by financial insecurity;89Lesure suggested that Debussygave most of the work onPolymnieto a young pianist, Francisco de La-


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

18/51

cerda.90The image of Debussy engaged in the drudgery of editorial workcertainly fits ill with cherished views of the avant-garde. But while it is

possible that others intervened, even at the most detailed level, the edi-tion that bore Debussys name remains an undeniable part of his publicpersona and in the present context deserves closer consideration: Polym-niewas issued under the weight of the symbolic burden that had beenplaced on Rameau by Debussy himself, and it bears in complicated wayson his historical imagination in relation to national identity.91

Polymniewas first performed during court celebrations of the vic-tory of Fontenoy in the conquest of Flanders in 1745; along with Plate,La princesse de Navarre, andLe temple de la Gloire, it earned Rameau the

title Compositeur de la Musique de la Chambre du Roi. Despite suchauspicious beginnings, it was revived only once, in 1753, and was drasti-cally curtailed for two further performances in 1754 and 1765. Neverfamous or respected,Polymniedid not appear in nineteenth-century col-lections of popular operatic airs, nor was a performance planned in con-nection with the new edition of 1908. Unlike other opra-balletssuch asLes Indes, which were supported by La Pouplinire and the Parisian pub-lic, Polymniereflects its state function in its preponderance of dance andallegorical spectacle and its simpler musical style. Rameaus fin-de-siclebiographers hardly mentioned the work.92Even Malherbe spelled out its

limitations: Les ftes de Polymniewill certainly not reappear in the the-ater; but the genius of the author should protect it from unjust distain;the work has its own value; it is part of the great Rameaus dramatic out-put; and history must at least evoke its memory in honor of the cause.93

Debussys essays leave no doubt about his general support for thecause; his involvement with this particular work seems less surprisingwhen considered as another facet of his historical imagination. Mal-herbes quotation from the greatEncyclopdieexplains:

[Polymnie] is one of the muses, thus named because of her many songs.

She is regarded as the inventor of harmony. . . . Her name is derived fromto remember, which means she presides over memory as well as history.. . . She is depicted with a crown of pearls, her right arm extends like anorator, and in the left there is a scroll on which is written saudere, to per-suade: here she presides over eloquence.94

Polymnie represents a meeting of the sounds that produce harmony andthe acts of memory that contribute to history; in her, history and mem-ory are like musical lines whose counterpoint produces compelling songsand convincing stories. She seems tailor-made for Debussys view of his-

tory, in which music, memory, and history were likewise combined in apowerful polemic about ancient and modern music.

Debussys Rameau 415

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

19/51

Louis de Cahusacs libretto is also concerned with history. Rameauhad lately revisedHippolyteand had omitted its allegorical prologue for

a public increasingly distanced from the monarchy. But Polymniewasdedicated to the king and addressed him directly: the authors invokedthe Lullyan connection between stagecraft and statecraft and offered atribute to history as witness of Frances military power. The prologue,Le temple de Mmoire, the only section honored with new scenery atthe premiere, also emphasizes the preoccupation with the past.95A cho-rus praises the king and celebrates historys lasting testimony to his glory;the Arts and Memory produce a gold statue of the monarch, which theyadorn with garlands and flowers; Victory arrives; and Polymnie dedicates

a song to her and proposes the performance of a drama in celebration ofthe king. The remaining acts explore different narrative genres, Le fa-ble, Lhistoire, and La ferie, and include mimetic devices such asbirdsong, hunts, andballets figursmusical equivalents of Watteausscenes. But with its long and elaborate prologue, Polymnieevoked thepast even at its first performance. The characters of Polymnie, Art, andMemory further tie the work to history: genre, allegory, plot, and musicalstyle make history their theme, and the link with traditional royal enter-tainments is reinforced. Debussys reconstruction of a work about monar-chical history and memory and his approval of it as part of the national

canon indicate one aspect of his engagement with the French past.His choices as an editor offer further insights. TheOeuvres com-

pltesused three main sources: the original manuscript, partly in thecomposers hand and with several layers of revisions and additions; acopy of the manuscript with significant alterations; and the first engrav-ing from the revival in 1753, which included remarks Rameau addedat the proof stage.96Because alterations reflect a flexible attitude to theoperatic score typical of the time, the idea of restoring the composersfirst version was anachronistic. But Debussys response is an opportunity

to understand his historical ideal: where Rameaus original eluded him,he was forced to make decisions based on a view of the composer formedindependently of the primary sources.

As we have seen, Rameaus orchestration had special meaningfor Debussy. In 1903 he praised the superb movement and energy ofRameaus orchestra, and in particular the energetic use of trumpets inCastor.97Most editors of theOeuvres compltesenhanced Rameaus or-chestration to make it more familiar to nineteenth-century audiences.98

Debussy was no exception. Some of Rameaus most interesting orchestraleffects inPolymniea trumpet fanfare for the arrival of Victory in the

prologue, and a series of hunting calls for horns in the air de chasseursin La feriewere accepted in the modern edition even though they


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

20/51

were late additions. And in many other passages Debussy added parts forflutes, oboes, and bassoons, thus creating a more diverse orchestration

and enhancing what he considered to be one of the nations most desir-able characteristics.

Debussys edition also expresses a particular view of Rameaus text-setting. Early in the prologue a choral scene in the Temple of Memorydescribes the marble and bronze walls on which the glorious stories ofheroic deeds are inscribed. Rameaus first idea was a long passage ofpolyphony, in which two separate lines of the text are declaimed simul-taneously (Ex. 1a, mm. 1524). Debussy consigned this passage to anappendix. He chose a later version, which had been transmitted in the

copy and the engraving for 1753. Here only one line of text is used, andit is presented homophonically (Ex. 1b). Debussy even enhanced thistexture by inventing woodwind parts to double the voices. The result isa simple, forceful setting of the text. Debussy might have preferred thissolely on musical grounds; but in light of his views about Rameau, itseems likely that he had additional reasons. Clarity of declamation wasone of the salient features of ancient and modern French opera as De-bussy understood it; and a vocal line that was supported rather than ob-scured by the orchestra was central to his comparison between Frenchand Wagnerian styles. By clearing away the polyphony to emphasize the

words Des ravages du temps sauvons la Vrit, Eclairons notre sicle etla postrit, he linked an ideal text-setting to the notion of history, re-vival, and national pride: these lines appear to be addressed not only toRameaus contemporaries, but also to Debussys imagined audience inthe 1900s.

Some textual ambiguities forced Debussy to take a position onthe mimetic idioms of Rameaus time. For example, an air for Polymnieexists in two different versions in the manuscript. In the earliest, alsotransmitted in the copy, Polymnie celebrates the kings victory by offer-

ing praise to Love. There are several melismas on the word volez (Ex.2a, mm. 1720, 35, 37, 3945); these conventional representations aresometimes emphasized by a high sustained a (mm. 2830, 38, 4142).But in the revised version, which Debussy chose by following the lateprint, Polymnie exhorts the warriors to come, listen to my voice (Ex.2b). Instead of a passage of vocal embellishment, here a flute part com-plements a simpler vocal line and creates a more varied sonority, andPolymnies importance in recording the good news is underlined by theplacement of the high a, now on the word voix (mm. 2022). Debussysearlier essays had praised the eighteenth-century style not only as a de-

fense against excessive German orchestration, but also as a means ofcounteracting the Italian fashion for commercialism and, as he put it,

Debussys Rameau 417

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

21/51


/

/

/

//

bb

bb

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

$

%

$

%

b

b

b

b

$

%

$

%

TOUS

DESSUS

HAUTES CONTRE

TAILLES

BASSES

1ers et 2ds

VIOLONS

ALTOS

BASSE CONTINUE

A

A

nos

nos

tra

tra

- vaux

- vaux

que

que

nos

nos

con

con

- certs

- certs

su

su

- nis

- nis

- sent!

-

1ers et 2ds

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

4

sent!

Des

Des

ra

ra

- va

- va

- ges

- ges

du

du

Temps

Temps

sau

sau

- vons

- vons

la

la

Ve

Ve

- ri

- ri

- te!

- te!

fort

fort

fort

Example 1a. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, prologue, scene 1. Original version (appendix 1908).

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

22/51

Debussys Rameau 419

Example 1a. continued

$

%

$

%

bb

b

b

$

%

$

%

Div. Unis.

1ers et 2ds

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

9

E

E

- clai

- clai

- rons

- rons

no

no

- tre

- tre

siecle

siecle

et

et

la

la

pos

pos

- te

- te

- ri

- ri

-

-

1ers et 2ds

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

te!

14

te! Des

E

ra

-clai

- va

- rons

- ges

no

Des

du

- tre

ra - v a

Temps

sie

- ges

sau

E

du

-vons

-clai - rons

Temps

la

no

sau

Ve

- cle,

- tre

- vons

E

- ri

-clai

-

-

doux fort

fort

fort

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

23/51

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

24/51

Debussys Rameau 421

b

b

bb

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

$

%$

%

1ers et 2ds

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

it

29

it

de

de

lim

lim

-mor

-mor

- ta

- ta

- li

- li

- te,

- te,

Jou

Jou

- it

- it

de

de

lim

lim

-mor

-mor

- ta

- ta

- li

- li

- te!

- te!


quantity over quality.99His choices in the prologue reject Italianate

virtuosity and conventional mimetic devices and match French restraintwith the shift in the libretto to an emphasis on Polymnie, history, mem-ory, and music.

My final examples are from La ferie, the story of Zims, who isliberated from a dark forest and transported to a decorative garden by hissweetheart, Arglie. A celebratory air for A rglie, Des plaisirs, existedin two versions. This time Debussys edition reproduced the first version(Ex. 3a), rejecting a revision in the manuscript and in the print of 1753,which featured a solo flute imitating a bird and a highly melismatic vocal

part (Ex. 3b). Another birdsong that included a demanding vocal linewith wide leaps and coloratura was omitted entirely. Debussys omissionwas not as simple as it might seem: although he rejected these virtuosopieces, he included some of the recitatives and ballets that were addedat the same time, on the same paper, in the same gathering, and in thesame handwriting. The dances enhanced the rococo element, and therecitatives satisfied Debussys search for a precedent for modern declama-tion; Arglies airs were perhaps unacceptable because they bore themarks of music composed to satisfy the demands of a singer and werebaroque in the original sense of the wordexcessively elaborate, Ital-

ianate, misshapen, and incomprehensible.100With a simpler musical

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

25/51


Example 1b. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, prologue, scene 1. Revised version (main text 1908).

b

b

[

[

l

l

l

$

%

$

%$

%$%

!

!

!

Fl.

Htb

Bons

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

15

Des ra - va-ges

Des

Des

Des

du

ra

ra

ra

- va

- va

- va

Temps

- ges

- ges

- ges

sau

du

du

du

-vons

Temps

Temps

Temps

la

sau

sau

sau

Ve

-vons

-vons

-vons

- ri

la

la

la

- te,

Ve

Ve

Ve

Des

- ri

- ri

- ri

ra

- te,

- te,

- te,

- va-ges

Des

Des

Des

du

ra

ra

ra

- va

- va

- va

Temps

- ges

- ges

- ges

sau

du

du

du

-vons

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

26/51

Debussys Rameau 423

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

b

$

%

$

%$

%$%

!

!

!

Fl.

Htb

Bons

Vons

Alt.

B. C.

22

Temps

Temps

Temps

la

sau

sau

sau

Ve

-vons

-vons

-vons

- ri

la

la

la

- te!

Ve

Ve

Ve

- ri

- ri

- ri

La

- te!

- te!

- te!

gloi-re des

La

La

La

he

gloi

gloi

gloi

-ros que

- re

- re

- re

des

des

des

nos

he

he

he

- ros

- ros

- ros

chants

que

que

que

ap

nos

nos

nos

-plau

chants

chants

chants

- dis

ap

ap

ap

- sent

- plau

- plau

- plau

Jou

- dis

- dis

- dis

- it ,

-sent

-sent

-sent

Example 1b. continued

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

27/51


//

/

/

[[

[

`

b

$

%

$

%

b

b

$

%

$%

b

b

$

%

$%

!

!

!

Gai

( )

( )

( )

VIOLONS

POLYMNIE

BASSECONTINUE

(Clavecin avec les Velles)

Vons

P.

B. C.

4

Vons

P.

B. C.

8

Des plai - sirs voi-ci lheur-eux jour. Guer -

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

doux

doux

doux

6 5

64 7

6

Example 2a. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, prologue, Ariette for Polymnie. Original version(appendix 1908).

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

28/51

Debussys Rameau 425


b

b

b

b

b

b

$

%

$

%

b

b

b

b

$

%

$%

b

$

%

$%

!

!

!

Vons

P.

B. C.

13

riers, du sein de la Vic - toi - re, Vo-lez dans les bras de lA - mour! Vo -

Vons

P.

B. C.

17

lez, vo -

Vons

P.

B. C.

22

lez, vo - lez, vo - lez dans les bras de lA -

5

6

6 7 7

9 5

6 7 9 8 2

6 6 4 7

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

29/51



$

%

$%

b

b

b

$

%

$%

b

b

b

b

b

b

$

%

$%

!

!

!VonsP.

B. C.

27

mour! Vo - lez! Des plai-sirs voi-ci lheur-eux

Vons

P.

B. C.

32

jour. Guer - riers, du sein de la Vic - toi - re, Vo - lez

Vons

P.

B. C.

36

dans les bras de lA - mour, Vo - lez dans les bras de lA - mour! Vo - lez,

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

a demi jeu doux

doux

doux

9 8 6

6 76

5

6

4 7

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

30/51

Debussys Rameau 427


b

b

b

$

%

$

%

b

b

b

$

%

$%

`

$

%

$%

!

!

!Vons

P.

B. C.

40

vo-lez

Vons

P.

B. C.

44

dans les bras de lA - mour!

Vons

P.

B. C.

48

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

FIN

5

6

4 7

5

64

66

6 5

6

4 7

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

31/51


Example 2b. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, prologue, A riette for Polymnie. Revised version (maintext 1908).

.

.

.

.

.

.

][][][

][

$%$

%$%

b

][

$%$

%$

%

!

!

!

!

(Unies)

(Modere)

Modere

( )

( )

( )

( )

Fl.

Vons

B. C.

(TOUS avec le Clavecin)

Fl.

Vons

B. C.

4

Ariette

5

6 7

6 5

6

4

6

6 6

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

32/51

Debussys Rameau 429


`7777

`7777`7777

`7777

$%$

%$%

b

b

\

b

$%$

%

$%

!

!

!

!

Fl.

Vons

B. C.

8

Fl.

Vons

B. C.

12

POLYMNIE

Guer-riers dont la vic - toi - re a cou-ron - ne les

doux

doux

doux

doux

5

6

4 7 9 5

6

7 6

7 5

6

7 6 6 5

6

4 7

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

33/51



7777777

b

[

$%$

%

$%

][

$%$

%

$%

!

!

!

!Fl.

Vons

P.

B. C.

17

te - tes, Ve - nez, ac-cou-rez a ma voix!

Fl.

Vons

P.

B. C.

21

Ve-nez pren-dre part a mes fe - tes!

un peu fort

poco[

un peu fort

fort

fort

fort

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

a demi jeu

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

34/51

style, clearer declamation, and an emphasis on dance and visual specta-cle, Rameaus role as a purveyor of French identity was yet more rigidlymaintained.

Debussys imprimatur on the edition ofPolymniegave substance tohis cherished convictions about Rameau and provided the history thathis own compositional styleparticularly that ofPellaslacked. In thissensePolymniewas yet another creation of his historical imagination.

Just as the Temple of Memory provided symbolic support to the projectto make Rameau contemporary, so Debussy seized on ambiguities inthe sources to derive a reading of the composers style as a model formodern music. Shearing off mimetic idioms and vocal excess, Debussysaved Rameaus oeuvre from Italianate extravagance; avoiding complexdeclamation, he represented Rameau as typically French; and allowinglate revisions when they included passages of colorful orchestration, herepresented Rameau as an antiromantic and a modern composer. He ef-fected his rescue ofPolymnieby expressing the notion of a living worknot in fidelity to an original or continuing creative process (he later

heaped derision on Rameaus audience for forcing on him changes thatconstrained his creative powers101), but by isolating it from any single

Debussys Rameau 431


b

$%$

%

$%

!

!

Fl.

Vons

P.

B. C.

25

Sur les curs des he - ros le plai - sir a ses droits.

6 5

64 7 5 46

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

35/51


Example 3a. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, La ferie, Air for Arglie. Original version (main text1908).

b

][

][

b

$%

b

b

$%

b

b

$%

!

!

!

(Modere)

Modere

( )

B. C.

ARGELIE

ZIMES

Que dat- traits!

Du prin - temps de la - ge Les ten - dres de - sirs Sont lheu-

A.

B. C.

reux

6

par - ta - ge. La fleur nou - vel - le sen - ga - ge

A.

B. C.

A

11

- vec les ze - phirs, Les oi - seaux par leur ra - ma - ge A lA -

Air

3 3

6 5

6

6 74

6

7 6

5 2 6

6 5

6

4 3 6 7 4

6 7

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

36/51

moment in history and pressing it into the service of a pure Frenchtradition that linked the eighteenth and twentieth centuries.

Debussysquerelles

In a recent study of Wagners impact in France, Philippe Lacou-Labarthesuggested that the shock of Wagnerism owed something of its force toa reversal of cherished beliefs about French identity and the relationshipof words to music. Wagners Schopenhauerian elevation of music madeit the primary tool in representing subjectivity, says Lacou-Labarthe; andhis relegation of poetry overturned the assumption, which had under-pinned French aesthetics since the eighteenth century, that literature,

not music, was the most expressive art.102

Wagnerians high regard formusic could be supported by reference to Jean-Jacques Rousseaus posi-tion, which emerged in debate with Rameau during the querelle des bouf-fonsin the 1750s: that literature is linked to (or even imprisoned andlimited by) language, whereas music inhabits the realm of feeling and in-stinct and is therefore universal. According to French Wagnerian theory,which offered a final word in the querelle, music worksin the dialecticsense of the word: it has the power to conciliate, to unify different forms,and that is why it dominates, why it is sovereign; but it also has thepower to resolve. . . and that is why it provides the universal organ. 103

Lacou-Labarthes description can be helpful in understandingDebussys agenda as essayist and editor. The composers emphasis on

Debussys Rameau 433


b

`

b

b

b

$%

!

A.

B. C.

mour

16

font un ten-dre hom - ma - ge De leurs feux et de leurs sou - pirs.

7 5

6 6 6 56

4

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

37/51


Example 3b. Rameau,Les ftes de Polymnie, La ferie, Air for Arglie. Revised version (appendix1908).

//

/

/

b

b

b

b

b

$

%

$%

b

b

b

b

$

%

$%

b

b

b

b

$%$

%

$%

!

!

!

1re Seule

Vons

B. C.

ARGELIE

Du prin - temps de la - ge, Les ten - dres de -

Vons

A.

B. C.

5

sirs Sont lheu - reux par - ta - ge; La fleur nou - vel - le sen -

Fl.

Vons

A.

B. C.

10

ga - ge A - vec les ze - phirs; Les oi - seaux, par leur ra -

33

a demi doux

doux

doux

tres doux

tres doux

7

7 6

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

38/51

Rameaus natural declamation and transparent sonorities suggested rev-erence for words; and his celebration of pleasure, grace, sensuality, andother rococo characteristics counteracted the ideal of transcendence in

Wagnerian theories but maintained the notion of expression in them.Although I am not sure Lacou-Labarthe would go so far, his discussion

Debussys Rameau 435


b

b

$%$

%

$%

b

b

b

b

b

$%

$%

$%

!

!

Fl.

Vons

A.

B. C.

15

ma - ge, a lA -

Fl.

Vons

A.

B. C.

20

mour font un doux hom - ma - ge De leurs feux et de leurs sou - pirs.

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

39/51

also suggests that as old quarrels were reignited by reference to distinc-tions between music (a universal) and language (marked or located

within a particular culture), so there was a more vigorous return to ques-tions of national identity. The eighteenth-centuryquerellehad addedcontentions about music and words to tussles between proponents ofItalian comedy and French tragedy, and between the ideological andaesthetic positions of the philosophesand the old order. By contrast, De-bussys singular emphasis on naturethe universal underlying conditionof a timeless French declamation, orchestration, melody, harmony, andemotional and aesthetic sensibilityaimed to wrest the sovereignpower of music from German and Italian composers, and ally it with lin-

guistic specificity and expression in the name of a strengthened Frenchidentity. Debussy wanted to have it both ways: he tried to mark a musi-cal style and a reverence for language as particularly French traits.104

Debussy and other editors of theOeuvres complteswere of courseaware that Rameau had been criticized in his own time for an excessiveattention to music, not words, and had therefore been vulnerable to thecharge of violating expectations with respect to comprehensibility in theoperatic genre.105Moreover, as Charles Dill has suggested, Rameaus de-bate with Rousseau may have been the impetus behind his reduction ofmusical complexity in revised versions ofH ippolyte, Castor, and other

works.106On the other hand, as is well known, Gluck and his librettist,Ranieri de Calzabigi, reacted against another kind of musical excessinItalian opera seriawhen they claimed in the dedication toAlcestetohave restored the primacy of words over music. But Debussy was uninter-ested. According to his view of history, the German style was burdenedwith dense and impenetrable orchestration and a system of musical for-mulae that obscured the words; in contrast, Rameaus luminosity exem-plified a balance between words and music that conveyed universal pas-sions by means of national traits. Debussys Rameau was universal and

French, timelessandever more closely identified with his own culture.His description of musical style flies in the face of one kind of history;but it does so, crucially, in the name of another: nationalism.

Debussys strenuous efforts to place the nationalist debate withina renewedquerelle des bouffonswere also observed by his contemporaries.Indeed, Malherbe was one of the first to note that interest in old musicwas informed by modern concerns. Writing on the occasion of the re-vival ofH ippolyte, Malherbe observed that this return to the past cre-ated a new orientation for the path ahead.107He adduced reasons forthis confluence: How and why do all these young composers act as ad-

vocates of the old master? It is because they regain through him someof their daring and aspirations, some of their pride and intoxication, in


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

40/51

short, a little of their ideal.108For Malherbe, Rameau took on a newappearance now that theOeuvres complteshad corrected the errors of

previous editions; this newness made him available to contemporary cul-ture.109Through their involvement with Rameau, the new generationwas being drawn into the thrall of a new querelle des bouffons:It will benecessary to declare oneself Gluckiste or Ramiste, and streams of ink willflow again in favor of or against the god of ones choice. Thus, living ordead, Rameau takes part in these battles.110Malherbes unparalleledcommitment to scholarly accuracy and faithful revival did not preventhim from recognizing the disputes of the ancien rgime as a vital engineof contemporary debate.

Debussy was the most outspoken Ramiste of his generation, andhis edition had given Rameau a new appearance. But his querellewasmore than an attempt to gain a belated victory against foreign styles. Itwas a corollary to an urgently awaited present conquest, one of whichhe would be a direct beneficiary. This conquest gives new meaning tohis subversion of editorial policy at the moments inPolymniewhenmemories of Frances imperial strength were at issue. It also points tothe importance of stylistic continuities betweenPellasandPolymnie,and to the further significance of Debussys description of Rameaus stylein essays that forged connections with the modern arts of the ancien

rgime. Neither the monarchy, nor the Revolution, but a united Frenchtradition was the victor at the very moment of its transformation intoan enduring modernist culture.

But Debussys idealizing did not prevent a repetition of events inthe querelle. Gluck was accepted at the Opra in fulfillment of govern-ment quotas for French works,111and despite critical interest, the perfor-mances ofHippolytein 1908 were short-lived by comparison with regularand successful Wagner revivals on the same stage.112The production,based on an edition by dIndy for theOeuvres compltes, undermined

Debussys tactics. DIndy enriched Rameaus harmonies and thickenedhis textures to match a Wagnerian style; and during rehearsals extra in-strumental lines were scribbled into the conductors score. The greatlyexpanded orchestra supported famous Wagnerian singers in all the mainroles.113 In 1915 Debussy complained that Wagners influence on per-formance practice was pervasive, adding, no one cares to admit that[Rameaus] performing style has been forgotten. It certainly will not beMonsieur dIndy, the Schola entrepreneur, who will revive it.114Had heseenCastorin 1918 he would have been no happier. Some critics praisedthe lavish eighteenth-century sets and costumes; but all but the most

scholarly compared the work unfavorably to Gluck and found Rameauwanting in drama and expression.115

Debussys Rameau 437

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

41/51

That the object of Debussys desires failed fully to materialize high-lights a paradox in the modernist project, the radical opposition between

an accurate restoration of forgotten artworks and a strengthened modernidentity. I have tried to expose this paradox by exploring Debussys his-torical imagination; a more detailed description of the disparities be-tween Rameaus scores, theOeuvres compltes, and revival performancesof Rameau would further underline the paradox, as would a discussionof DebussysHommage Rameau. But it is clear, even within the limitedterms of the present discussion, that the impossibility of accurate restora-tion in the service of nationalism does not merely account for the failureof Debussys and Laloys projects to create new ftes galantesimmediately

after the publication ofPolymnie, or for an edition ofPolymniethat re-made Frances glorious history as a precedent for a modern musical utopia.It also points to the conflicting demands placed on a culture whose his-tory seemed ever more distant and whose future was ever less secure.

Debussys public alliance with Rameau thus exposes troubling con-nections between nationalist historicism and the idea of a homogenousmodern identity. The problematic role of imagined communities andinvented traditions is well known in this context.116But, as Homi K.Bhabha has shown, by exposing as an illusion the idea of a communityin constant progress, we may learn still more about the ideologies that

underpin claims of continuity in modern nationalist narratives.117Forexample, Bhabha notes that Debussys contemporary Ernest Renan em-phasized the importance of a collective act of remembering. Rather thanmerging seamlessly with the present, the past was first forgotten; it wasthen recalled in a purged form, as a unified image of the modern people,thus re-entering the present by what Renan called the will to perpetu-ate the value of the heritage that one has received in an undividedform.118Bhabha develops from this a double time in nationalist writ-ing: on the one hand, the pedagogic or historical notion of a collective

people involved in a cumulative tradition; on the other, a performativeconstruction of the people as reproductive and contemporary. Cover-ing up the disjunctions and tensions between these two serves the ideo-logical interests of those individuals who map their own ideals on to theimage of the people, thus excluding others and asserting, artificially, acoherent national culture, past and present.119

This discussion has explored Debussys somewhat frantic attemptsto create an illusion of historical continuity. The fragility of that illusionis most obvious when the demands of accurate restoration conflict withhis ideal of contemporary national identity: in Bhabhas terms, Debussy

merged pedagogic and performative narratives when he claimedRameau as his contemporary. Debussy filtered a totalized French musical


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

42/51

tradition through the image of an individual, Rameau, and presented hisown story of anti-Wagnerian differentiation and historical revisionism as

the story of the nations music as a whole. And he took advantage of thefigure of Polymnie (in whom connotations of time and timelessness alsomix) to create an edition of Rameaus work that straddled the boundarybetween a progressive ideal of historical continuity and an isolated mo-ment in contemporary music. Furthermore, his will to perpetuate a re-configured past by remembering an ancient quarrel was motivated by apalpable desire to purge the modern French style of its German and Ital-ian others. Through this process Debussys public persona and his char-acterization of Rameau could become twin exemplars of a homogenous

national tradition.Laloys image of Debussy as a worthy successor to Rameau be-comes more pungent in this context, the critics complicity with De-bussys nationalism amply testifying to the attraction of such narratives:Debussys imagined proximity to Rameau received contemporary en-dorsement because it satisfied desires for a continuous French musicaltradition, and it has persisted because musicologists like to explain thedevelopment and emergence of musical styles along chronological lines.As we have seen, Debussys claim of kinship with Rameau fits such a his-tory only by means of a trick of perspective. Rather than a direct ances-

try, Debussys relationship with his predecessor operates on differenttemporal levels at once. It was a response to Wagners influence in thepresent and recent past; it was a strategic position that attempted to cir-cumscribe the future reception of his national identity; and, most imagi-natively, it placed Rameau in a distant past that had been forgotten andcould be remembered fully only as an image of the present. We canthink of Debussys historical imagination as an arabesque that mergedancient and modern, fantasy and reality: the vignette at the centershowed Debussy and Rameau together; it was linked by means of essays,

editions, art, design, and music, to a frame of intertwined ideas aboutFrench history. Each detail contributed to a picture of a national identitypurged of foreign styles. Debussys historical imagination thus supportedthe public persona he created as a polemicist for, and a savior of, an idealFrench tradition. Laloys account is a straightforward reproduction ofthis image. Beneath its surface are hints of a more troubled relationshipbetween the individual, the nation, and its others.

Notes

Many thanks to Katherine Bergeron, Carla Hesse, and Richard Taruskin for help withearly work on this material; and to Thomas Laqueur, Roger Parker, Stuart Proffitt, andMichael P. Steinberg for invaluable comments on later versions.

Debussys Rameau 439

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

43/51

1. See announcement in Le Figaro, 17 Feb. 1918, Bibliothque dArsnal, Paris [here-after B.A.]: Ro 4121 (1).

2. Lubin sang Kundry at the Bayreuth Festival in 1939; in 1946 she was condemned forcollaborating after her gardener and his wife died in concentration camps. SeeLe Monde,89 Dec. 1946, B.A.: Ro 5394.

3. On other performances during the war, see Charles Dupchez,H istoire de lOpra deParis: un sicle au palais Garnier, 18751980 (Paris: Perrin, 1984), 15160; and Jane F.Fulcher, The Composer as Intellectual: Ideological Inscriptions in French Interwar Neo-classicism,Journal of Musicology17, no. 2 (1999): 197230.

4. Laloy studied at the Schola Cantorum and at the Sorbonne, where he received oneof the first doctorates in musicology in France; he was a renowned music critic, havingwritten forRevue musicale, Mercure musicale, La grande revue, andLanne musicale. See

Deborah Priest,Louis Laloy (18741944) on Debussy, Ravel, and Stravinsky(Brookfield,Vt.: Ashgate, 1999), 12.

5. Nous vmes ses traits se creuser, son regard se ternir. Il fut oblig de garder la cham-bre, puis le lit. Oh! Ce lit! ce lit! nous disait-il avec dsespoir. LOpra, cependant, pr-parait la reprise deCastor et Polluxdont la rptition gnrale fut donne le jeudi 21 mars1918, dans laprs-midi, car on craignait le soir les alertes davions. Ce fut un de sesderniers regrets que de ny pouvoir assister. Essayant de sourire, il me disait de sa voixteinte, en me voyant partir: Bien le bonjour M. Castor! Deux jours plus tard, lesamedi matin, le bombardement de Paris par canons longue porte commenait. I l en-tendit, ses derniers jours, le bruit lugubre des explosions, et cessa de souffrir le lundi25 mars; Louis Laloy,

La musique retrouve, 19021927(Paris: Plon, 1928), 22829.

6. Jann Pasler, Pellasand Power: The Reception of Debussys Opera, inMusic at theTurn of Century: A N ineteenth-Century M usic Reader, ed. Joseph Kerman (Berkeley andLos Angeles: University of California Press, 1990), 12950.

7. Franois Lesure,Claude Debussy: biographie cri tique(Paris: Klincksieck, 1994), 251.Laloys support for Debussy is clear from numerous articles; relevant here are Exercicesdanalyse,Revue musicale(15 Nov. 1902): 47173; Claude Debussy: simplicit enmusique,Revue musicale(15 Feb. 1904): 10611; Le drame musical moderne,Mercuremusical(1 Aug. 1905): 23350; andClaude Debussy(Paris: Dorbon Ain, 1909).

8. Le 21 mars 1918 restera lanniversaire dune rsurrection. Le plus grand musicien de

lancienne France, Jean-Philippe Rameau, a retrouv sa gloire. . . . Ce succs unanime estune mmorable victoire de got franais. Par un cruel retour, le destin qui en ce momentnous prodigue les preuves a frapp dune mort prmature le plus digne hritier deRameau, le musicien qui seul avait su recouer cette tradition de force mesure, delimpide profondeur et dincorruptible harmonie, en lenrichissant de toutes les impres-sions acquises par la sensibilit moderne; Louis Laloy, Castor et Pollux lOpra: mortde Claude Debussy, 30 Mar. 1918, B.A.: Ro 4121 (1).

9. Debussy wrote forGil Blasfor six months in 1903 and then published only sporadi-cally until 1912, when a new contract with the Socit International de Musique pro-duced several more essays. His essays are collected inMonsieur Croche et autres crits, ed.Franois Lesure (Paris: Gallimard, 1987); they are translated inDebussy on Music: TheCritical Writings of the Great French Composer, ed. Franois Lesure, trans. Richard Lang-ham Smith (New York: Knopf, 1977).


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

44/51

10. Edward Lockspeiser,Debussy: H is Life and Mind, 2 vols. (London: Cassell, 196265), 2:5961; and Lesure,Debussy, 238.

11. Dieter Winzer,Claude Debussy und die franzsische musikalische Tradition(Wies-baden: Breitkopf and Hrtel, 1981). Earlier discussions of archaic styles in Debussys mu-sic include Ursula Eckart-Bcker, Claude Debussys Verhltnis zu Musikern der Vergan-genheit,Die Musikforschung30 (1977): 5663.

12. Scott Messing,Neoclassicism in Music from the Genesis of the Concept through theSchoenberg/Stravinsky Polemic(Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 1996), 3849.

13. Michael Downes, Wagner and theMusicien franais:An Interpretation of De-bussys Criticism,Cahiers Debussy1718 (199394): 313; Jrg Stenzl, VerspteteMusikwissenschaft in Frankreich und Italien? Musikforschung im Spannungsfeld vonNationalismus, Reaktion und Moderne, inMusikwissenschaft : Eine versptete Disziplin?

Die akademische Musikforschung zwischen Fortschrittsglauben und Modernittsverweigerung,ed. Anselm Gerhard (Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, 2000), 281305.

14. Jane F. Fulcher, French Cultural Politics and Music from the Dreyfus A ffair to the FirstWorld War(New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 17678.

15. Fulcher, French Cultural Polit ics, 17986.

16. Fulcher, French Cultural Polit ics, 176; and The Composer as Intellectual, 206.

17. Fulcher, French Cultural Polit ics, 170, 186.

18. Fulcher, French Cultural Polit ics, 180. Compare Lesure,Debussy, 2045, who claimsthe best evidence of Debussys political position was his association with the DreyfusardRevue blanche.

19. I discuss this piece and Debussys relationship to the French keyboard tradition inanother essay, Memory and Imitation in DebussysHommage Rameau (forthcoming).

20. In thinking about this problem I have found the following particularly helpful:Roger Parker, Falstaffand Verdis Final Narratives, inLeonoras Last A ct: Essays in Ver-dian Discourse(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), 100125; Richard Taruskin,Stravinsky and the Subhuman, inDefining Russia M usically: H istorical and Hermeneuti-cal Essays(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), 36088; and Bernard Williams,Wagner and Politics,New York Review of Books(2 Nov. 2000): 3643.

21. The Schola Cantorum (established in 1894) was devoted to the revival of Grego-rian chant and other ancient music; it was directed by the composer Vincent dIndy, whodeveloped a conservative program of training intended to rival that of the Conserva-toire; see Fulcher,French Cultural Politics, 2426, 2835, 4859. On earlier concert per-formances of Rameau, see Christine Wassermann, Die Wiederentdeckung Rameaus inFrankreich im 19. Jahrhundert,Archiv fr Musikwissenschaft50, no. 2 (1993): 16486.

22. Nous avions pourtant une pure tradition franaise dans loeuvre de Rameau, faitede tendresse dlicate et charmante, daccents justes, de dclamation rigoureuse dans lercit, sans cette affectation la profondeur allemande, ni au besoin de souligner . . . dex-pliquer perdre haleine; Claude Debussy, la Schola Cantorum [Gil Blas, 2 Feb.1903], inCroche, 91.

23. Cette clart dans lexpression, ce prcis et ce ramass dans la forme; Debussy, la Schola Cantorum, 91.

Debussys Rameau 441

8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

45/51

24. Lair-monologue de Pollux . . . si personnel daccent, si nouveau de construction,que lespace et le temps sont supprims, et Rameau semble un contemporain; Debussy,

la Schola Cantorum, 92.25. Que lon veuille bien me pardonner davoir tant crit . . . mon excuse sera dabordRameau, qui en valait la peine, puis les minutes de vraie joie dans la vie sont rares, et jaivoulu quelles ne me soient pas personnelles; Debussy, la Schola Cantorum, 93.

26. Entre nous, vous prosodiez fort mal; du moins, vous faites de la langue franaiseune langue daccentuation quand elle est au contraire une langue nuance. (Je sais . . .vous tes allemand); Claude Debussy, Lettre ouverte Monsieur le Chevalier C. W.Gluck [Gil Blas, 23 Feb. 1903], inCroche, 101.

27. Rameau tait infiniment plus grec que vous;Debussy, Lettre ouverte, 102.

28. Marc Fumaroli, Le gnie de la langue franaise, in Les lieux de mmoire, 3 vols, ed.Pierre Nora (Paris: Gallimard, 1997), 3:462385.

29. Zeev Sternhell, The Political Culture of Nationalism, inNationhood and Nation-alism in France: From Boulangism to the Great War, 18891918, ed. Robert Tombs (NewYork: Harper Collins, 1991), 2238.

30. Fulcher, The Composer as Intellectual, 2056. In a later essay she elevates thisinconsistency by enlisting Bakhtins idea of the dialogic; see Speaking the Truth toPower: The Dialogic Element in Debussys Wartime Compositions, inDebussy and H isWorld, ed. Jane F. Fulcher (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), 20332.

31. De vous avoir connu, la musique franaise a tir le bnfice assez inattendu detomber dans les bras de Wagner; je me plais imaginer que, sans vous, a ne serait nonseulement pas arriv, mais lart musical franais naurait pas demand aussi souvent sonchemin des gens trop intresss le lui faire perdre; Debussy, Lettre ouverte, 102.

32. Claude Debussy, propos dH ippolyte et A ricie [Le Figaro, 8 May 1908], inCroche, 2025.

33. Carolyn Abbate, Tristanin the Composition ofPellas,N ineteenth-CenturyMusic5, no. 2 (1981): 11741; Katherine Bergeron, The Echo, the Cry, the Death ofLovers,N ineteenth-Century M usic18, no. 2 (1994): 13651; Robin Holloway,Debussyand Wagner(London: Faber and Faber, 1979); and Pasler, Pellasand Power.

34. Stephen Huebner, French Opera at the Fin de Sicle: Wagnerism, Nationalism, and

Style(New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 2021.35. Lesure,Debussy, 21429.

36. Christophe Charle, Debussy in fin-de-sicleParis, inDebussy and His World, ed.Jane F. Fulcher (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), 27195.

37. Claude Debussy, Impressions sur laTtralogie Londres [Gil Blas, 1 June 1903], inCroche, 18084. On Wagners influence in France, see Huebner, French Opera;and AnyaSuschitzky, Fervaal, Parsifal, and French National Identity,N ineteenth-Century M usic25, nos. 23 (20012): 23765.

38. Il y a l une langue vocatrice dont la sensibilit pouvait trouver son prolonge-ment dans la musique et dans le dcor orchestral. Jai essay aussi dobir une loi debeaut quon semble oublier singulirement lorsquil sagit dune musique dramatique; lespersonnages de ce drame tchent de chanter comme des personnes naturelles; ClaudeDebussy, Pourquoi jai critPellas et Mlisande [Apr. 1902], inCroche, 63.


8/10/2019 Suschitzky 398 448

46/51

39. Il fallait donc chercher aprsWagner et non pasd aprsWagner; Debussy,Pourquoi ji crit Pellas, 63.

40. On historical research, see Pim den Boer,H istory as a Profession: The Study of H is-tory in France, 18181914, trans. Arnold J. Pomerans (Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress, 1998), 10713; Charles-Oliver Carbonell,H istoire et historiens: une mutationidologique des historiens franais, 18651885(Toulouse: Edouard Privat, 1976);Christophe Charle, Les intellectuels en Europe au XIXe sicle: essai dhistoire compare(Paris: Seuil, 1996); and Paul Farmer,France Reviews I ts Revolut ionary Origins: Social Poli-tics and H istorical Opinion in the Third Republic(New York: Columbia University Press,1944).

41. Philip Nord, Social Defence and Conservative Regeneration: The National Re-vival, 190014, inNationhood and Nationalism in France: From Boulangism to the GreatWar, 18891918, ed. Robert Tombs (New York: Harper Collins, 1991), 224; Nord, TheRepublican Moment: Struggles for Democracy in N in

Suschitzky 398 448

Documents

Transcript of Suschitzky 398 448