Interpreters And Interpretations

by Carl van Vechten

Interpreters and Interpretations, written by Carl Van Vechten in 1917, is a collection of essays that explore the art of interpretation in various fields including literature, music, and art. The book is divided into three parts, with the first part examining the role of the interpreter in the creative process, and the second and third parts focusing on specific examples of interpretation in literature and music, respectively.Van Vechten argues that interpretation is a necessary and valuable aspect of art, and that the interpreter plays a crucial role in bringing meaning and understanding to a work of art. He also discusses the various factors that can influence interpretation, such as the interpreter's own experiences and biases, the historical and cultural context in which the work was created, and the intended audience of the work.The essays in the second part of the book delve into specific works of literature, including Shakespeare's Hamlet and the poetry of Walt Whitman, exploring the different interpretations that have been offered over time. The third part of the book focuses on music, with essays on composers such as Beethoven and Wagner, and the ways in which their music has been interpreted and reinterpreted over the years.Overall, Interpreters and Interpretations offers a thoughtful and thought-provoking exploration of the art of interpretation, and the ways in which it shapes our understanding of art and culture.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.

376 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1917

About the author

Carl van Vechten (B.A., University of Chicago, 1903) was a photographer, music-dance critic, novelist, and patron of the Harlem Renaissance who served as literary executor for Gertrude Stein.

Van Vechten was among the most influential literary figures of the 1910s and 1920s. He began his career in journalism as a reporter, then in 1906 joined The New York Times as assistant music critic and later worked as its Paris correspondent. His early reviews are collected in Interpreters and Interpretations (1917 and 1920) and Excavations: A Book of Advocacies (1926). His first novel, Peter Whiffle (1922), a first-person account of the salon and bohemian culture of New York and Paris and clearly drawn from Van Vechten's own experiences, and was immensely popular. His most controversial work of fiction is Nigger Heaven (1926), notable for its depiction of black life in Harlem in the 1920s and its sympathetic treatment of the newly emerging black culture.

In the 1930s, Van Vechten turned from fiction to photography. His photographs are in collections at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and elsewhere. An important literary patron, he established the James Weldon Johnson Collection of Negro Arts and Letters at Yale.