Fanny Hensel's seasons of life: Poetic epigrams, vignettes, and meaning in Das Jahr

Abstract

The poetic epigrams and vignettes that precede the movements of Fanny Hensel's Das Jahr in the recently discovered autograph allow for a new, enriched interpretation of the work, previously believed to depict the composer's Italian sojourn. Hensel's music is frequently shaped by the poems from which the epigrams were taken: works by Schiller, Uhland, Eichendorff, Tieck, and Goethe. The epigrams, vignettes drawn by Wilhelm Hensel, and references to other compositions combine to evoke the passage of time and the seasons of human life, a narrative of change tinged with a melancholic sense of loss, in a genuinely Romantic musical cycle. Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.