M (John Cage book)

Last updated • 3 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
M: Writings ’67–’72
M - Writings 67 to 72.jpg
Author John Cage
PublisherWesleyan University Press
Publication date
1973
Pages217 pp.
ISBN 978-0-8195-4058-4
OCLC 520710

M: Writings ’67–’72 is a book of essays by American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992), first published in 1973 by Wesleyan University Press.

Contents

M was Cage's third full-length book, after Silence: Lectures and Writings and A Year from Monday . All of the essays in it were written between 1967 and 1972. [1] :44 [2] :9 Charles Hamm, a biographer of Cage, has said "virtually his entire career as composer, poet and visual artist was counterpointed by his own words", including this volume in the middle of his most productive years. [2] :9 Henahan, writing for The New York Times Book Review , contrasted the "uncollectable and unpreservable, gaily but deliberately writ on water" form of his music with "slight chance of outliving him by much" to the solid permanence of his writing, including M. [3] In 1981, Henahan predicted that only Cage's four books of essays, including M and that year's For The Birds, would be remembered in 2001. [4]

Thoreau's influence on Cage

M was Cage's first work after his exposure to Thoreau, considered possibly "a decisive moment in Cage's artistic life" by Thoreau scholar Jannika Bock. Bock also analyses the book's title to be not as Cage said, chosen randomly, but taken from the title of one of Cage's works in the collection, "Mureau", a portmanteau of "music" and "Thoreau". Cage wrote about the importance of the word Mureau in the book's foreword in which he said that it was both one of the more unconventional texts contained in it, and that vocalization of the word itself formed the basis of many of his then-recent musical performances. [1] :45

Bock further notes that seven out of eleven of the poetic works in M mention Thoreau by name, and she and another scholar counted between 27 and 30 direct or indirect references to Thoreau in the book. [1] :45

Contents

The book contains the following writings:

Related Research Articles

Henry David Thoreau 19th-century American essayist, poet and philosopher

Henry David Thoreau was an American naturalist, essayist, poet, and philosopher. A leading transcendentalist, he is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay "Civil Disobedience", an argument for disobedience to an unjust state.

John Cage American avant-garde composer

John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, artist, and philosopher. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. He was also instrumental in the development of modern dance, mostly through his association with choreographer Merce Cunningham, who was also Cage's romantic partner for most of their lives.

Christian Wolff (composer) American composer of experimental classical music

Christian G. Wolff is an American composer of experimental classical music.

Louis Zukofsky

Louis Zukofsky was an American poet. He was one of the founders and the primary theorist of the Objectivist group of poets and thus an important influence on subsequent generations of poets in America and abroad.

Stanley Cavell American philosopher

Stanley Louis Cavell was an American philosopher. He was the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard University. He worked in the fields of ethics, aesthetics, and ordinary language philosophy. As an interpreter, he produced influential works on Wittgenstein, Austin, Emerson, Thoreau, and Heidegger. His work is characterized by its conversational tone and frequent literary references.

Tom Hayden American social and political activist, author, and politician (1939–2016)

Thomas Emmet Hayden was an American social and political activist, author, and politician. Hayden was best known for his role as an anti-war, civil rights, and intellectual activist in the 1960s, authoring the Port Huron Statement and standing trial in the Chicago Seven case.

Sound art is an artistic discipline in which sound is utilised as a primary medium or material. Like many genres of contemporary art, sound art may be interdisciplinary in nature, or be used in hybrid forms.

Shigeko Kubota Japanese artist (1937–2015)

Shigeko Kubota was a Japanese video artist, sculptor and avant-garde performance artist, who mostly lived in New York City. She was one of the first artists to adopt the portable video camera Sony Portapak in 1970. Kubota is known for constructing sculptural installations with a strong DIY aesthetic, which include sculptures with embedded monitors playing her original videos. She was a key member and influence on Fluxus, the international group of avant-garde artists centered on George Maciunas, having been involved with the group since witnessing John Cage perform in Tokyo in 1962 and subsequently moving to New York in 1964. She was closely associated with George Brecht, Jackson Mac Low, John Cage, Joe Jones, Nam June Paik, and Ay-O, other members of Fluxus. Kubota was deemed "Vice Chairman" of the Fluxus Organization by Maciunas.

Edward Hoagland is an American author best known for his nature and travel writing.

<i>Empty Words</i>

Empty Words: Writings '73–'78 is a book by American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992), first published in 1979 by Wesleyan University Press.

Music of Changes is a piece for solo piano by John Cage. Composed in 1951 for pianist and friend David Tudor, it is a ground-breaking piece of indeterminate music. The process of composition involved applying decisions made using the I Ching, a Chinese classic text that is commonly used as a divination system. The I Ching was applied to large charts of sounds, durations, dynamics, tempo and densities.

Cheap Imitation is a piece for solo piano by John Cage, composed in 1969. It is an indeterminate piece created using the I Ching and based, rhythmically, on Socrate by Erik Satie.

American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992) started composing pieces for solo prepared piano around 1938–40. The majority of early works for this instrument were created to accompany dances by Cage's various collaborators, most frequently Merce Cunningham. In response to frequent criticisms of prepared piano, Cage cited numerous predecessors. In the liner notes for the very first recording of his most highly acclaimed work for prepared piano, Sonatas and Interludes, Cage wrote: "Composing for the prepared piano is not a criticism of the instrument. I'm only being practical." This article presents a complete list of Cage's works for prepared piano, with comments on each composition. All of Cage's indeterminate works for unspecified forces can also be performed on or with Prepared Piano.

<i>Silence: Lectures and Writings</i> Book by John Cage

Silence: Lectures and Writings is a book by American experimental composer John Cage (1912–1992), first published in 1961 by Wesleyan University Press. Silence is a collection of essays and lectures Cage wrote during the period from 1939 to 1961. The contents of the book is as follows:

<i>A Year from Monday</i> Book by John Cage

A Year from Monday: New Lectures and Writings is a collection of essays, lectures and journal entries from 1961–1967 by American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992), first published in 1967 by Wesleyan University Press. Its contents are:

<i>X</i> (Cage book)

X: Writings ’79–’82 is a book by American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992), first published in 1983. The book includes mesostics on the names of various people. In the forward to X, Cage writes that the volume's texts represent an attempt "to find a way of writing which comes from ideas, is not about them, but which produces them." The book contains the following works:

Moira Roth English feminist art historian

Moira Roth was a feminist art historian and art critic who was Trefethen Professor of Art History at Mills College in Oakland, California from 1985 to 2017. She taught at the University of California, San Diego from 1974 to 1985. She was educated at the London School of Economics in England, and received a B.A. in sociology and an M.A. from New York University and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley in 1974. She wrote extensively on contemporary art, editing The Amazing Decade: Women and Performance Art in America 1970-1980, A Source Book, published by Astro Artz (1983). Her collection of essays, Difference/Indifference: Musings on Postmodernism, Marcel Duchamp and John Cage, was published, with a commentary by Jonathan D. Katz, by Psychology Press (1998), exploring the construction of masculinity and conflicting identities. She received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Women's Caucus for Art in 1997, and the National Recognition in the Arts Award from the College Art Association in 2006. She appears in Lynn Hershman Leeson's 2010 documentary film !Women Art Revolution.

Professor Arvind M. Shah retired from his professorship in the Department of Sociology at the University of Delhi in 1996. He had been a student of M. N. Srinivas in 1952 and became a teacher in sociology at Maharaja Sayajirao University, Baroda, in 1958. He moved to the University of Delhi in 1961.

Louise Varèse American translator

Louise Varèse, also credited as Louise Norton or Louise Norton-Varèse, was an American writer, editor, and translator of French literature who was involved with New York Dadaism.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Bock 2008.
  2. 1 2 Hamm 2013.
  3. Henahan 1973.
  4. Henahan 1981.

Sources