Genetic Criticism and the Creative Process

‘Genetic criticism might appear to destabilize the final text, undermining the work-concept by privileging genesis over structure’ (p. 1). ‘All the more reason not to be defensive about it’ might be a common response to that editorial note of caution in today's musicological climate. But William Kinderman rightly seeks, in his Introduction, to underline the principled catholicity and comprehensiveness of the critical methods demonstrated in this book. ‘Analysis remains vitally important to the evaluation of sketches and drafts, whose content is often elusive and enigmatic’ (ibid.). Not that scholars wish to deprive their subject art works of such precious aesthetic qualities. The aim is to understand better why the elusive and the enigmatic persist: and that is all to the good, given that surviving sketches and drafts can only rarely be presented as part of what can be shown to universal satisfaction to be a full and unambiguous account of ‘the creative process’—even when, as in one case here, the composer is living and willing to participate in the genetic criticism of his own composition.

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