Conference Agenda

One oft-cited theory for why the Titanic’s sinking remains compelling is that the ship represented a microcosm of Edwardian society. Turn-of-the-century strict class boundaries, for example, are emphasized in every depiction of the disaster. But in films about the sinking, is the onscreen societal microcosm that of 1912 or of the time of the film’s creation? In this talk, I argue that William Alwyn’s and James Horner’s scores for A Night to Remember (Baker, 1958) and Titanic (Cameron, 1997) offer insight into how the balance of contemporary and historical influences often leans toward the former, shaping the representation of the historical past in film.

In these films, Alwyn’s and Horner’s scores inscribe differing views of social class. For example, Horner’s Irish-infused score for Titanic participates in a broader romanticization of both Irish culture and the working class in 1990s America (Harrison, 2010), while Alwyn’s more subtle, quasi-religious music for A Night to Remember reflects the comparatively traditional British society of the late 1950s (Rosen, 2003). Beyond the specifically-composed scores, I analyze the pre-existing songs used in the film intertextually, inspired by the work of Spring (2013), Lasser (2019), and Lee (2016), to demonstrate how the pre-existing music—including popular songs, hymns, and “light” classics—significantly contributes to the films’ depiction of social class.

While the promotion of both films maintained an emphasis on historical accuracy, the films themselves also propose a perspective on the present-day society that makes the original event relevant to a 1958 or a 1997 audience (Koldau, 2012). The filmmakers’ choice of music directly impacts how the films present modern society in the guise of the past. This role is most apparent in the pre-existing music, but the scores, too, reflect the films’ attitudes toward the role of class in both the contemporary and historical moment. Studying the music in these two Titanic films contributes to an understanding of the broader role music plays in films about history more generally, ultimately demonstrating the complex interactions between music, history, and the present.

In the second half of the nineteenth century, Richard Wagner (1813-83) became a renowned figure in England. Wagner visited London in 1839, 1855, and 1877 to perform his operas including Tannhäuser and The Flying Dutchman with the Philharmonic Society of London; and by the time of the 1880s, the London public was ready to become aficionados of Wagner. Since the foundation of the London Wagner Society in 1873, and since Francis Hueffer published Richard Wagner and the Music of the Future in 1874, Wagner’s music was performed at various venues including the Grosvenor Gallery in the West End of London. He was also acclaimed by artists such as Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), Aubrey Beardsley (1872-98), and Bernard Shaw (1856-1950).

This paper explores Wagnerism in England of the 1890s to discuss how the cult of Wagner contributed to the advance of the British Fin de Siècle, which refers to the sociocultural milieu at the turn of the century when people shaped their ideas of decay, degeneration, and convalescence. In existing studies of British musical modernism, Wagner’s art has been less discussed because of its foreign origin. However, I argue that Wagnerism was central to the development of the cultural movement of British decadence, by examining works by the two Wagnerites: Wilde and Beardsley, who represent the Victorian Fin de Siècle. To do so, I will investigate Wagner’s music, operatic works, and aesthetic philosophy as represented in Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), and Beardsley’s black-and-white illustrations including Tannhäuser (1891), Siegfried Act II (1892), and The Wagnerites (1894).

My paper will conclude that Wagnerism in England built its characteristics of “Britishness” which makes “British Wagnerism” distinguished from the continental Wagnerism. This happens when contemporary British artists employed Wagnerian elements in their works as cryptic symbols suggestive of ideas such as pleasure, sickness, and (aberrant) sexual impulses to challenge the domestic rules in Victorian England. By investigating the significance of Wagnerism in the Victorian Fin de Siècle, my paper will reinterpret the cultural history of musical modernism as developed in late-nineteenth-century England.

The fatal expedition of English Antarctic explorer Robert F. Scott (1868–1912) has been etched in the British psyche since his death. His doomed race to the South Pole with four other men inspired music, visual art, and stories as soon as news of their deaths reached London, and commemoration of the Terra Nova expedition continues to play an important role in perceptions of Antarctic heritage and Britishness. Paul Pelham and Lawrence Wright’s popular song “’Tis a Story that Shall Live For Ever” (1913) is one such example. Though it hasn’t been considered in scholarship, the song’s text and music are particularly illuminating as to how Scott’s story was instantly memorialized in ways that drew on his own writings and inextricably linked him to pre-1914 ideas of Britishness. “’Tis a Story” was first recorded just two weeks after Scott’s death was reported at home, and it was initially paired on a record with Pelham and Wright’s popular Titanic memorial song “Be British,” which likewise emphasizes and intertwines sacrifice, courage, and Britishness.

This paper highlights similarities between the two songs and shows that the musical commemoration of Scott’s expedition in “’Tis a Story” captures the sentiments of the moment, some of which historian Max Jones addresses in his essay “‘Our King Upon His Knees’: The Public Commemoration of Captain Scott’s Last Antarctic Expedition” (2000). The framing of the Terra Nova deaths as British heroism in “’Tis a Story” not only conflates Britishness and Englishness, but it is also representative of historic attitudes toward Antarctic exploration. Both of these factors enabled the song to valorize the lost men as well as the achievements of Britain’s South Atlantic conquests. This framing is something that has continued into the present with commemorations of Scott (and other explorers and expeditions) that are haunted by nationalistic sentiments.