Acknowledgments

A book twelve years in the making incurs many debts. I fear that my memory is not what it was when I began, so please let me know if I have neglected you, and we will celebrate another way!

I thank Pieter Martin, my editor at the University of Minnesota Press, for believing in this book. Warm thanks to Anne Carter, editorial assistant, for her incisive responses to my many queries, to Paula Dragosh for expert copyediting, and to Jeff Clark for a stunning cover.

I am grateful for the kindness and wisdom of three professors at my home institution, Grinnell College: Daniel Reynolds in German, Alan Schrift in philosophy, and Eugene Gaub in music. Dan was my constant interlocutor during the development of this book. He helped me decipher Kurt Schwitters’s Fraktur, gave me confidence to write about German poetry and prose as well as art, and reminded me what matters whenever I began to go off track. Alan is an enormous figure in the Nietzsche world, yet he graciously offered advice for my foray into Nietzsche studies. Gene agreed to play many of the unknown Lieder discussed in this book, as well as to explain their intricacies. It was an invaluable experience for me to hear the piano music as the people in this book might have heard it. I also thank Karen Hueftle-Worley, who provided digital images of the highest quality, frequently in a rush. Kay Wilson, Print and Drawing Room, offered stalwart support in acquiring objects related to this project, some of which appear in this book and all of which inspired it and our students. I am grateful to hundreds of students who helped me refine—or reconsider—my ideas over the years. Further, I have been privileged to have extraordinary undergraduate research assistants at Grinnell. Those whose work focused on this project are Remy Ferber, Eliza Harrison, Rebecca Park, and Courtney Sheehan. Thank you for your labor and your inspiration. Finally, I thank Grinnell’s Committee for the Support of Faculty Scholarship for underwriting numerous research trips and for contributing a subvention so that the book in your hands could feature color plates.

Beyond Grinnell, there are many art historians and Germanists whose work and friendship have inspired me: Nell Andrew, Mark Antliff, Juliet Bellow, Marcia Brennan, Anna Brzyski, Mark Cheetham, Jay Clarke, Frances Connelly, Dorothea Dietrich, Susan Funkenstein, Freyja Hartzell, Sandy Isenstadt, Juliet Koss, Katherine Kuenzli, Rose-Carol Washton Long, Maria Makela, Margaret Menninger, Marsha Morton, Bibiana Obler, Irina Oryshkevich, Eleonora Pistis, and Joyce Tsai. Among Sturm scholars abroad, I have appreciated the camaraderie of Barbara Alms, Karla Bilang, Irene Chytraeus-Auerbach, Lidia Głuchowska, Andrea von Hülsen-Esch, Ulrike Steierwald, Isabel Wünsche, Hubert van den Berg, Maiike van Rijn, and András Zwickl. I have benefited from the generosity of scholars who knew me only through the mail yet shared pertinent ideas or information for my research: Starr Figura (about original prints), Robert Hodonyi (about Nietzsche Evenings), Susanna Krause and Julia Rinck (about papermaking), Andreas Meyer (about Walden’s music), Don Quaintance (about the Art of This Century gallery), and Gwendolen Webster (about Kurt Schwitters).

I have been moved by how chance can open a world and close a circle: it was my graduate research on Paul Klee that led me to discover the underexplored Sturm-Archiv at the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, and my friendship with Susan Bernstein led us to explore Weimar together. I went for the Bauhaus archives, she for Franz Liszt’s—providing my introduction to Liszt and leading to my trip with Susan to Budapest to learn more. It all came together when I learned that Herwarth Walden, director of Der Sturm, had studied piano with a student of Liszt. Even more, I have been moved by extraordinary generosity: near the end of this process, my manuscript was thirty thousand words too long to publish, and when I happened to bemoan the situation to my neighbor, professor emeritus Rudolf Kuenzli, he offered, of his own accord, to read it and suggest cuts. He also gave precious encouragement, and the book you see today is far better for it. Closer to the end, at a moment of doubt, Riccardo Marchi—another scholar writing about Der Sturm—eschewed competitive distance and invited me, whom he barely knew, for two days of vibrant intellectual exchange with him, his colleagues, and his students at the University of South Florida. I returned enriched and emboldened, and I look forward to Marchi’s own book.

Over the years I have visited many museums and archives. Eef Overgaauw and Jutta Weber of the Manuscript Department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin have been generous with their collection and inspiringly curious about visitors’ projects, and Dorothea Barfknecht helped me decipher letters. At the Berlinische Galerie, Ralf Burmeister has been a willing interlocutor and source for materials. Masha Chlenova kindly showed me works in storage at the Museum of Modern Art. Sandy Isenstadt and I were treated to a careful inspection of Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven’s God thanks to Sally Malenka and Ashley Carey at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. June Can provided dozens of files at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. At the Yale University Art Gallery, Suzanne Boorsch and Elisabeth Hodermarsky showed me Sturm-related objects, and Jennifer R. Gross and I enjoyed a long discussion about the Société Anonyme, much of whose collection is in Yale’s care and whose history she knows better than anyone.

The acquisition of images is never easy. Many sources or custodians whom I have not personally met were nevertheless obliging: Zuzana Bencová at the City of Prague Museum, Tammy Carter at the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, Karin Ellermann at the Klassik Stiftung Weimar, Jonas Hänggi at the Kunstmuseum Basel, Joachim Hiltmann at the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg, Margaret Huang at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Ingrid Kastel at the Albertina in Vienna, Marta Koscielniak at the Gabriele Münter- und Johannes Eichner-Stiftung in Munich, Sarah Luko at the University of Iowa Museum of Art, Jill Meissner at the Friedrich Kiesler Foundation in Vienna, Laurel Mitchell at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, Rebekah Morin at the Milwaukee Art Museum, Nick Munagian in Special Collections at Northwestern University Libraries, Jacek Orłowski at the National Museum in Poznan, Klaus-Dieter Pett at the Landesarchiv Berlin, József Uri-Kovács at the National Széchényi Library in Budapest, David Whaples and Wyatt Lasky at the Yale University Art Gallery, and Rita Wolters at the Werkbund-Archiv in Berlin. I thank Oleg Timofeyev for trying, however unsuccessfully, to transfer rubles to the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow. Finally, having visited the Schwitters Archiv at the Sprengel Museum in Hannover some years back and knowing exactly which images to order when the book was ready to go to press, I discovered that the archive was closed for reconstruction in 2016. Isabel Schulz instructed an assistant to find the pertinent works, in one case under the stairs, and I am forever indebted.

Closer to home, many provided emotional support and occasional child care: Carrie Hough and Rob Decker, Anne Jensen, Jill Kinkade, Frannie and Sean Malone, Miranda Meyer and Stephen Lovely, and Jeff Vande Berg and Melissa O’Donnell. Thanks to Elia Pontaza for housecleaning so that I could work on the book. I thank dear friends Martha Brettschneider, Chris Castro, Jessica Clothiaux, and Nines Morcuende for talking about everything and nothing. My immeasurable gratitude to Jess Fiedorowicz for giving me consolation at the right moment. Eileen Bartos, I am so fortunate that my piano teacher is also such a skilled editor!

I return, finally, to the beginning, middle, and future. Thank you to my parents, Donald and Noël Anger, for encouraging me to think differently, even when it may be difficult. I also greatly appreciate their donation to cover a shortfall in image expenses. Thank you to Robert Scholes, a cherished mentor at Brown University, for encouraging me long ago to work on material I love. The last time I saw him, I told him that organizing this book by metaphors might make the book one I would want to read, but I was not sure I could pull it off. He inspired me to write the book I wanted to read regardless, and I thank him for giving me courage. Bob died in December 2016, and I will always keep him in my heart. Thank you to my dear husband, Mike, who takes me seriously and always makes me laugh, precious gifts both. And to Frances, our daughter, whose entire life has been shared with this book: now it is done and there will be more time just for you. I will never forget what you said as a four-year-old: “Mama, make the words of your book sing, and I will sing them to my daughter someday.” I hope we all sing to each other for years to come.