French Literature Reviews - 2026
T. Picard, Wagner, une question européenne. Contribution à une étude du wagnérisme (1860-2004)
Comparative and World Literature
Review in Acta Fabula: “Wagner, a Truly European Question”, by Anne Chalard-Fillaudeau.
Timothée Picard, Wagner, une question européenne. Contribution à une étude du wagnérisme (1860-2004), Presses Universitaires de Rennes, coll. " Interférences", 2006, 552 p.
- ISBN 2753503028
- 22€
Publisher's overview:
In a provocative formulation, Nietzsche declared that "Wagner alone sums up modernity." This book takes as its starting point a twofold challenge posed by Wagner to literature: first, the challenge that literature should "reclaim from music something that was rightfully its own"; second, an ethical, aesthetic, and political challenge that compels literature to question the very substance of music.
A former student of the École Normale Supérieure, holder of the agrégation, and graduate of Sciences Po Paris, Timothée Picard is a senior lecturer in comparative literature at the University of Rennes 2. A specialist in the relations between literature, music, and the history of ideas, he has authored or co-authored books on Gluck, Mozart, and Wagner, and works as a music critic.
Table of Contents:
- Towards a European Narrative: Scenes and Figures of the Wagnerian Challenge
- The Challenge of Modernity
- The Challenge of the Philosophy of History
- The Challenge of the Absolute
Downloads:
The reception of Richard Wagner in European culture has long generated intense critical debate across literary and philosophical traditions. From the late nineteenth century onward, writers and thinkers continually engaged with the aesthetic and political implications of the Wagnerian legacy. Readers interested in comparative literature, European intellectual history, and the intersections of music and letters may find this study relevant to their inquiries.
Timothée Picard is a senior lecturer in comparative literature at the University of Rennes 2 and a specialist in the relations between literature, music, and the history of ideas. This volume, published by the Presses Universitaires de Rennes in 2006, examines the twofold challenge posed by Wagner to literature regarding music, modernity, and the philosophy of history across the period from 1860 to 2004.
Introduction (PDF file, 446 KB)