ABSTRACT
Donald Francis Tovey characteristically captures something vital about Robert Schumann's symphonic style – how it moves in quick, repeated bursts but does not give the impression of covering a lot of ground – though he chooses to present this insight in terms of immaturity. Most critics miss in Schumann's symphonies the cogent grandeur of the Viennese Classical style. Schumann's movements are more like paintings in a well-appointed gallery than psychologically consequential stages of a multi-movement Classical-style sonata. As dramatic compositions, the overtures enjoy the advantages of single-movement construction: each has the potential to be heard as a unitary effusion. Schumann's famous remark about the 'heavenly length' of Schubert's symphony is intended to compare the plenitude of that symphony to the rich diversity of content Schumann finds in the novels of Jean Paul. Arnfried Edler shows how this valuation of broadly inclusive novelistic diversity finds expression in Schumann's own symphonies.
