Eduard Hanslick's On the Musically Beautiful (Vom Musikalisch-Schonen, 1854), written and published before the author turned 30, is a watershed document in the history of aesthetics, and of thought about music generally. It defines a boundary between a heteronomic view of music, which allowsfor external influences in a musical work, and an autonomic view, which focuses on music's internal properties and processes. Hanslick embraces the latter view as vigorously as he dismisses the former. The notion of "absolute music," which lies at the heart of the treatise, has been, and is now morethan ever at the center of discussions about music generally, particularly that of the Classic and Romantic eras. This new translation, of the 10th edition (1902), includes three introductory essays offering new perspectives on Hanslick and his treatise: on its origins, publications and translation history; its central concepts; and its philosophical underpinnings. Additional features include footnotedannotations, which clarify various issues of vocabulary, translation, and historical context; a readers' guide, which suggests shorter and longer paths through the book, depending on readers' available time and level of interest; a glossary of the treatise's important terms and concepts; and anappendix, which translates parts of chapter one of the first edition that were radically changed in subsequent ones, and also the original ending of the treatise, which Hanslick excised in later editions. The book's ideas, cogently and often wittily expressed, are mandatory reading for anyoneinterested in eighteenth and nineteenth-century music and its cultural and intellectual background. | Eduard Hanslick's On the Musically Beautiful by Lee Rothfarb, Hardcover | Indigo Chapters