ABSTRACT
Stravinsky begins by relating musical performance to 'diction'. Stravinsky conceives of language as normally not only expressive, but invasive, claiming the right to translate into its own logic the functioning of all media, including music. Language, therefore, to Stravinsky, has two faces. From one point of view, it is the enemy of the composer, when it demands the right to translate the meaning of his work into its medium. From another point of view, it is the composer's necessary ally, his means to connect his own individual works to the great and timeless body of Art. The evidence from the writings Stravinsky published before he met Robert Craft confirms that the anti-expressivism is his. The original formulation of Stravinsky's notorious principle that music is powerless to express anything is to be found in Chroniques de ma vie, the first book published under Stravinsky's name, in 1935.
