Tema Con Variazioni Introduction
by Lewis Carroll
English novelist and poet. Famous for his children's stories, especially Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There (1871). His children's poems include Phantasmagoria (published with other poems in 1869), The Hunting of the Snark (1876) and Sylvie and Bruno (1889). He also published various mathematical treatises of which the most notable is his light-hearted defence of Euclid, Euclid and his Modern Rivals. His stories and poems have been seen as revolutionising children's literature,
breaking with and even parodying the moral tales which had previously dominated.
Tema Con Variazioni
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Why is it that Poetry has never yet been subjected to that process of Dilution which has proved so advantageous to her sister-art Music? The Diluter gives us first a few notes of some well-known Air, then a dozen bars of his own, then a few more notes of the Air, and so on alternately: thus saving the listener, if not from all risk of recognising the melody at all, at least from the too- exciting transports which it might produce in a more concentrated form. The process is termed "setting" by Composers, and any one, that has ever experienced the emotion of being unexpectedly set down in a heap of mortar, will recognise the truthfulness of this happy phrase. For truly, just as the genuine Epicure lingers lovingly over a morsel of supreme Venison - whose every fibre seems to murmur "Excelsior!" - yet swallows, ere returning to the toothsome dainty, great mouthfuls of oatmeal-porridge and winkles: and just as the perfect Connoisseur in Claret permits himself but one delicate sip, and then tosses off a pint or more of boarding-school beer: so also - |