F. Chopin

Franz LisztProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.9

Word count: 464K words
Chapters: 47

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.F. Chopin by Franz LisztAuthor: Liszt, Franz, 1811-1886,Language: French, Class: ML: Music: Literature of music, Release Date: Jun 3, 2007

Editor's review

This is Liszt's biographical work on Chopin, written in French and belonging to music literature; it is now freely published by Project Gutenberg. Liszt and Chopin moved in the same nineteenth-century Romantic music circles, and his account carries the close observation and personal judgment of a contemporary, making it both a primary source for understanding Chopin the man and a reflection of Liszt's own musical views and prose style. The book's strength lies not in systematic biographical research but in its critical touch and period atmosphere, suiting readers interested in Romantic piano music, composers' biographies, and nineteenth-century music criticism. Readers should note the author's standpoint and the limitations of his era, not taking the book's judgments as final but reading them against later scholarship. Since the original is in French, readers need some French ability or the aid of translations and reference works.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in Chopin's life and Romantic piano music
Students of music history who need contemporary documentary materials
Music lovers with French reading ability who want to read the original
Readers interested in music criticism and the biographical genre

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking systematic chronological biographical research
Beginners with no French and no translation to assist them
Serious researchers expecting modern scholarly annotations and citations

Reading tips

First become familiar with Chopin's major works and the background of nineteenth-century Parisian musical circles; Liszt's commentary will then be easier to grasp.
While reading, distinguish factual narrative from the author's evaluations, marking passages with a subjective tone.
Read alongside later Chopin biographies to compare how authors of different eras describe the same events.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book written by Liszt, and what language is it in?

According to the sources, the author is Franz Liszt and the original language is French; it belongs to music literature. It is published by Project Gutenberg as a free eBook, and readers need some French reading ability or the aid of translations and reference works.

Can the accounts in the book be taken directly as historical fact?

They should not be taken directly as final. Liszt was a contemporary of Chopin, so his account has the value of close observation, but it also contains personal evaluations and the limitations of its era. It is best treated as a primary document and critical text, read against later scholarship to distinguish fact from judgment.

Can I read this book without knowing French?

You can read with the aid of published translations or translation tools, though details of tone and wording in the original will be lost. If your main aim is to learn about Chopin's life, read a translation first to grasp the content; if you want to study Liszt's French prose style, some French foundation is still necessary.

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About the author

Franz Liszt Author · Hungarian · 1811–1886

Franz Liszt (1811–1886) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and conductor, and a leading figure of Romantic music. Through his exceptional pianistic skill and composition he exerted a profound influence on music history and was later hailed as the “King of the Piano.” His output spans solo piano works, symphonic poems and collections of letters; he pioneered the symphonic poem and helped advance program music. This site holds four of his works, including F. Chopin, Life of Chopin and the two volumes of Letters of Franz Liszt, which show him as a commentator and letter writer: he focuses on composers' lives and critical appraisal of their works, and his letters record his friendships and the musical life of his time in clear, distinctly personal prose.