Wagner in Context

Approachable, concise chapters from a wide range of perspectives illuminate this complex figure along with his contemporary and current contexts.

Few composers embodied wider cultural interests than Wagner. This collection brings together leading scholarship on Wagner, his social and intellectual contexts, and reception while casting an eye forward to contexts of Wagner's ongoing reception, from video gaming to sound recording, Israel to German media theory, and twenty-first century warfare.Few composers embodied wider cultural interests than Wagner or had greater cultural consequences. This is the first collection to examine directly the rich array of intellectual, social and cultural contexts within which Wagner worked. Alongside fresh accounts of historical topics, from spa culture to racial theory, sentient bodies to stage technology, America to Spain, it casts an eye forward to contexts of Wagner's ongoing reception, from video gaming to sound recording, Israel to Friedrich Kittler, and twenty-first century warfare. The collection brings together an international cast of leading authorities and new voices. Its 42 short chapters offer a reader-friendly way into Wagner studies, with authoritative studies of central topics set alongside emerging new fields. It sheds new light on previously neglected individuals such as Minna Wagner, Theodor Herzl and Houston Stewart Chamberlain, and investigates the global circulation of Wagner's works, his approach to money, and the controversies that continue to accompany him.