Wagner's Ring and German Drama

Wagner's Ring, an important phenomenon of the German drama tradition, is situated and examined alongside other major works of the canon. Wagner defines tragedy as a mythological drama. The theoretical foundation of the Ring is a complex dialectic of history and myth. By contrasting the Ring with the dramas of Schiller, Hebbel, Hofmannsthal, and Brecht different facets of Wagner's work are uniquely highlighted beyond theoretical generalizations or broad overviews. This series of comparisons offers fresh insight into the interrelationships of the Ring with the previous German drama tradition, and also investigates its influence on twentieth-century drama and opera.Scholars of German literature and culture will appreciate this innovative interpretation and study of the Ring. New ideas proposed include the suggestions that Schiller's Wallenstein trilogy might have served as a covert source for the Ring and that Ariadne auf Naxos and Mahagonny represent parodies of the Ring. The theory underlying the Ring will attract musicologists and interdisciplinary literary scholars interested in the interrelationship between words and music and literature and opera.

"Having successfully deconstructed the Ring, Mary Cicora now turns her sharp and practiced eye to situating Wagner in the larger story of German drama, from Schiller to Brecht. The results are impressive."-Paul Robinson Professor of History, Stanford University Author, Opera and Ideas: From Mozart to Strauss, .,."this book represents a dedicated and thorough effort in research and scholarship."-The Opera Journal, ?...this book represents a dedicated and thorough effort in research and scholarship.?-The Opera Journal, ?The author departs radically from the many studies on Wagner's influence on both music and literature, with her focus on myth versus history in German drama....Amply documented, this refreshing and provocative interdisciplinary study is recommended to literary critics, musicologists, and students of culture at all levels. A must for all libraries.?-Choice, ?We can thank Mary Cicora for her insights into Wagner's refabrication of mythology and indebtedness to Romantic irony and for her thoughtful placement of Wagner in the center of a tradition stretching from Schiller to Brecht.?-Opera Quarterly

MARY A. CICORA is author of Mythology as Metaphor: Romantic Irony, Critical Theory, and Wagner's RING (Greenwood, 1998). After attending Yale, she received her doctorate degree in German Literature from Cornell.