The Musical Novel

<p>What is a "musical novel"? This book defines the genre as musical not primarily in terms of its content but in its form. The musical novel crosses medial boundaries aspiring to techniques structures and impressions similar to those of music. It takes music as a model for its own construction borrowing techniques and forms that range from immediately perceptible essential aspects of music (rhythm timbre the simultaneity of multiple voices) to microstructural (jazz riffs call and response leitmotifs) and macrostructural elements (themes and variations symphonies albums). The musical novel also evokes the performance context by imitating elements of spontaneity that characterize improvised jazz or audience interaction. The Musical Novel builds upon theories of intermediality and semiotics to analyze the musical structures forms and techniques in two groups of musical novels which serve as case studies. The first group imitates an entire musical genre and consists of jazz novels by Toni Morrison Albert Murray Xam Wilson Cartier Stanley Crouch Jack Fuller Michael Ondaatje and Christian Gailly. The second group of novels by Richard Powers Gabriel Josipovici Rachel Cusk Nancy Huston and Thomas Bernhard imitates a single piece of music J. S. Bach's Goldberg Variations. Emily Petermann is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Konstanz.</p>