Frederic Chopin (1810-1849) composed his great music under abstract titles such as: Preludes, Mazurkas, Berceuses, and Waltzes. Modern education advocates graphic descriptive captions that tell incidents: that is why Mr. Schaum has substituted historically interesting titles for the abstract terms. The original titles are always in parentheses. This wealth of true biographical information adds musical appreciation to these authentic Chopin excerpts.This newly engraved edition will be welcomed by teachers and students.

Born into a South Boston Irish family in 1950, Belle O'Shane attends a good Catholic school, studies ballet in downtown, adores debate and literature, but is sent away to a convent in Quebec because she is unique. She sees and feels what others cannot. She daily experiences God in a separate reality-or does she? Soon, her fragile state of mind and her body become the private laboratory of a Harvard medical student-an event that is bound to change not only her life.

"Warsaw was aware of and in tune with the most recent European styles and fashions in music, but it was also the cradle of a vernacular musical language that was initiated by the generation of Polish composers before Chopin and which found its full realization in his work. Had Chopin been born a decade earlier or a decade later, Goldberg argues, the capital - devastated by warfare and stripped of all cultural institutions - could not have provided support for his talent. The young composer would have been compelled to seek musical education abroad and thus would have been deprived of the specifically Polish experience so central to his musical style."--BOOK JACKET.

Chopin in Paris introduces the most important musical and literary figures of Fryderyk Chopin's day in a glittering story of the Romantic era. During Chopin's eighteen years in Paris, lasting nearly half his short life, he shone at the center of the immensely talented artists who were defining their time -- Hugo, Balzac, Stendhal, Delacroix, Liszt, Berlioz, and, of course, George Sand, a rebel feminist writer who became Chopin's lover and protector. Tad Szulc, the author of Fidel and Pope John Paul II, approaches his subject with imagination and insight, drawing extensively on diaries, memoirs, correspondence, and the composer's own journal, portions of which appear here for the first time in English. He uses contemporary sources to chronicle Chopin's meteoric rise in his native Poland, an ascent that had brought him to play before the reigning Russian grand duke at the age of eight. He left his homeland when he was eighteen, just before Warsaw's patriotic uprising was crushed by the tsar's armies. Carrying the memories of Poland and its folk music that would later surface in his polonaises and mazurkas, Chopin traveled to Vienna. There he established his reputation in the most demanding city of Europe. But Chopin soon left for Paris, where his extraordinary creative powers would come to fruition amid the revolutions roiling much of Europe. He quickly gained fame and a circle of powerful friends and acquaintances ranging from Rothschild, the banker, to Karl Marx. Distinguished by his fastidious dress and the wracking cough that would cut short his life, Chopin spent his days composing and giving piano lessons to a select group of students. His evenings were spent at the keyboard, playing for his friends. It was at one of these Chopin gatherings that he met George Sand, nine years his senior. Through their long and often stormy relationship, Chopin enjoyed his richest creative period. As she wrote dozens of novels, he composed furiously -- both were compulsive creators. After their affair unraveled, Chopin became the protégé of Jane Stirling, a wealthy Scotswoman, who paraded him in his final year across England and Scotland to play for the aristocracy and even Queen Victoria. In 1849, at the age of thirty-nine, Chopin succumbed to the tuberculosis that had plagued him from childhood. Chopin in Paris is an illuminating biography of a tragic figure who was one of the most important composers of all time. Szulc brings to life the complex, contradictory genius whose works will live forever. It is compelling reading about an exciting epoch of European history, culture, and music -- and about one of the great love dramas of the nineteenth century.

"Toth and Seyersted's well-organized, carefully edited volume makes available all manuscripts and related items from all archival collections.... This volume is essential for American literature collections." -- Choice An edition of the primarily unpublished papers of Kate Chopin, author of the feminist classic The Awakening. These papers illuminate the growth of Chopin as a writer, reveal the reactions of critics to her work, and settle a number of controversies in Chopin studies.

Featuring essays by scholars from around the globe, Kate Chopin in Context revitalizes discussions on the famed 19th-century author of The Awakening . Expanding the horizons of Chopin's influence, contributors offer readers glimpses into the multi-national appreciation and versatility of the author's works, including within the classroom setting.

Providing all the tools for engaged, informed individual analysis of the text, this is an essential starting point for students of American literature and women's writing, or for anyone fascinated by Chopin's controversial work.

Although the representation of suicide is commonplace in literature, few studies have explicitly dealt with the meaning of suicide in the works of women writers. The Art of Dying applies theories concerning the division of women literary figures into angels or monsters to representative literary suicides of the nineteenth century, including the suicides of women characters in works by Kate Chopin and Sylvia Plath. The Awakening by Kate Chopin is often misunderstood by critics who read it using the Romantic paradigm. Chopin breaks that paradigm by presenting the suicide of Edna Pontellier as heroic. Suicide is a prevalent motif and theme in two works by Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar and Ariel. An extensive analysis of Plath's last poem «Edge» portrays the suicide of the speaker as a calm and heroic act in keeping with the tone set by Chopin in The Awakening. The Art of Dying concludes by exploring women's need for self-actualization within the framework of love, marriage, and motherhood - institutions that have always demanded from women an unnatural and harmful degree of unselfishness. The inherent message in the works of artists such as Chopin and Plath is that women should not have to die in order to live.

The original CliffsNotes study guides offer expert commentary on major themes, plots, characters, literary devices, and historical background. The latest generation of titles in this series also features glossaries and visual elements that complement the classic, familiar format. In CliffsNotes onThe Awakening you experience one woman’s desire to find and live fully within her true self. Her devotion to that purpose causes friction with her friends and family, and also conflicts with the dominant values of her time. Summaries and commentaries will help you understand events of the novel, as well as their meaning. You’ll also gain insight into the life and background of the author, Kate Chopin. Other features that help you study include Character analyses of major players A character map that graphically illustrates the relationships among the characters Critical essays A review section that tests your knowledge A ResourceCenter full of books, articles, films, and Internet sites Classic literature or modern-day treasure—you'll understand it all with expert information and insight from CliffsNotes study guides.