Andrew Thomson

Over sixty years after his death in 1931, Vincent d'Indy is still a much misunderstood and maligned figure in French music. Previous biographers have left a portrait of the academic figure par excellence, who turned the seemingly inspired and selfless inspiration of his master César Franck into a cold and authoritarian pedagogical system. This new study re-examines the evidence, reveals a much more psychologically complex and turbulent character, and finds that d'Indy was a tireless propagandist for a spiritual revival of French musical civilization. Yet he was fully aware of the social and intellectual problems of the secular Third Republic which militated against his Dante-inspired Catholic humanism, embodied in the work of the Schola Cantorum, the Paris institution founded by d'Indy to reform the practice of sacred music. Far from being a pure reactionary, his outlook was in reality remarkably progressive, manifest in his revivals of early music, notably Monteverdi's Orfeo, his encouragement of Debussy, and his willingness to engage - often pugnaciously - with the latest musical manifestations of Richard Strauss, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and Varèse. His own compositions likewise contain passages of astonishingly bold invention and modernistic effects, all too easily overlooked.

The War on Terror has remained an enduring feature of American foreign policy for over two decades. This short history positions the War on Terror within the broader context of Cold War interventionism and the rise of various transnational threats to American (and global) security during the late twentieth century. It introduces readers to the main concepts, debates and theories which have been used to understand and make sense of the War on Terror. These include approaches that frame it as a disparate set of policies aimed at reducing the risk of terrorist attacks against American citizens at both home and aboard; as part of a project aimed at helping maintain the United States’ dominant position within international politics; and as an idea intimately bound up with perceptions of American national identity and America’s place in the world. In this way, the book aims to show how the War on Terror has changed global politics, as well as why it has been fought and proven so difficult to end despite multiple failed attempts at course correction. The book is ideally suited for courses on international security, American foreign policy and contemporary world politics.

The War on Terror has remained an enduring feature of American foreign policy for over two decades. This short history positions the War on Terror within the broader context of Cold War interventionism and the rise of various transnational threats to American (and global) security during the late twentieth century. It introduces readers to the main concepts, debates and theories which have been used to understand and make sense of the War on Terror. These include approaches that frame it as a disparate set of policies aimed at reducing the risk of terrorist attacks against American citizens at both home and aboard; as part of a project aimed at helping maintain the United States’ dominant position within international politics; and as an idea intimately bound up with perceptions of American national identity and America’s place in the world. In this way, the book aims to show how the War on Terror has changed global politics, as well as why it has been fought and proven so difficult to end despite multiple failed attempts at course correction. The book is ideally suited for courses on international security, American foreign policy and contemporary world politics.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1882.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1882.