The turn of the 17th
and 18th centuries witnessed a very rapid development of some
literary and musical genres. It is then, thanks to Handel and his
contemporaries preceded by the genius of Purcell, that both the opera and later the English
oratorio flourished. Never apart, music and letters became even more tightly
entwined. Their interplay ranged from Purcell’s music composed especially for
theatre, through various settings of literary works including the opera’s use
of literary tradition and culminated in the
true fusion of music and literature in the English oratorio, where the
printed libretto accompanied the musical performance.
With the growing popularity of
musical entertainment came the rapid development of the instruments, they also
became more and more accessible for home performance resulting in the widespread study and practice of music.
This in turn allowed for the growing presence of musical characters in another successful new genre-the novel.
The emergence of Romanticism with
its renewed focus on the poetic form and its interest in folk tradition
introduced new ways in which poetry and music could interact. The Victorian
cult of Handel and the further evolution of the novel are also areas where the
question of the relationship between music and letters can be studied.
