Aesthetic theory and the representation of the feminine in orchestral program music of the mid-nineteenth century

Recent attempts to show how instrumental music reflects societal attitudes about gender in the nineteenth century have been hampered by difficult questions of what those works portray, according to the aesthetics of the time. To address the problem, this study examines depictions of female characters through the lens of mid-nineteenth century criticism, within the context of a reevaluation of the aesthetic history of orchestral program music. Case studies of representations of the feminine illustrate the changes in aesthetic theory and vice versa.; Eighteenth-century composers and theorists held program music in low esteem, and early Romantics like E. T. A. Hoffmann regarded Beethoven's programs as peripheral to the music's ability to reveal the ideal world beyond appearances. The aesthetic outlook of A. B. Marx was far more hospitable for program music because it took root in Hegelian idealism, which located the ideal in a universal mind. Hegel argued that music lacked an objective content, but Marx described an objective content in Beethoven's music using the language of program music, as in his description of masculine and feminine themes in sonata form. In his essays on Beethoven's overtures he recognized the second theme's potential to represent Klarchen or Valeria, but identifies Leonore with the first theme, demonstrating a flexible approach.; When Liszt shifted his focus to composition around 1848, his aesthetic lay closer to Hoffmann's than Marx's. After a debate with Wagner in 1851--1853 about what the Tannhauser overture represents, in which the depiction of Venus figured prominently, Liszt accepted the explicit program and shifted towards a Marxian aesthetic. In 1855 Liszt quoted Hegel and A. B. Marx in a series of essays that established an aesthetic in which the program provided an objective content while the music presented an immediate emotional experience. The portrayal of Gretchen in the "Faust" Symphony exemplifies this aesthetic. As can be seen in two contemporary reviews and a new analysis of the final chorus, Liszt recast Goethe's Gretchen to focus on the ideal that pervades program music of this period: the eternal feminine.