Overcoming and the Übermensch: Contexts for Mahler’s Benevolent Ambition
Gustav Mahler’s 1896 statement about the final movement of his Third Symphony serves as a window into his conception of ambition: “It is the last stage of differentiation: God! Or if you like, the Übermensch.” The composer’s equation of Nietzsche’s Übermensch, a figure characterized in Also sprach Zarathustra by an egoistic striving for greatness, with not only God but also a symphonic movement titled “What Love Tells Me,” suggests Mahler interpreted ambition as both compassionate and encouraging. The fourth and fifth movements of the Third Symphony set texts that align with this notion: Nietzsche’s “Midnight Song” from Also sprach Zarathustra, which is defined by its cautious concern for man, and “Es sungen drei Engel” from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, a celebratory receipt of the Lord’s blessing. The programmatic narratives of Mahler’s First and Second Symphonies also convey encouraging messages of overcoming and achievement, in part through Mahler’s settings of various texts within each symphony. This unusual definition of ambition, a typically self-interested effort, was not unique to Mahler. The composer shared this reading with fellow members of the Pernerstorfer Circle, a group of young intellectuals who attended the University of Vienna in the 1870s. This group included the future leader of the Social Democrats Victor Adler and politician Heinrich Braun, whose conceptions of ambition were defined by their socialist credo. Also active in the group were the playwright and dramatist, Richard Kralik, who invoked the Übermensch as a religious ideal, and the writer Siegfried Lipiner, whose redemptive dramas contain allusions to Nietzsche’s Zarathustra. Considering the notion of ambition depicted in Mahler’s first three symphonies alongside the political writings of Adler and Braun, as well as the dramatic works of Kralik and Lipiner, reveals resonances among conceptions of benevolent ambition within Mahler’s circle in fin-de-siècle Vienna.
Gustav Mahler’s 1896 statement about the final movement of his Third Symphony serves as a window into his conception of ambition: “It is the last stage of differentiation: God! Or if you like, the Übermensch.” The composer’s equation of Nietzsche’s Übermensch, a figure characterized in Also sprach Zarathustra by an egoistic striving for greatness, with not only God but also a symphonic movement titled “What Love Tells Me,” suggests Mahler interpreted ambition as both compassionate and encouraging. The fourth and fifth movements of the Third Symphony set texts that align with this notion: Nietzsche’s “Midnight Song” from Also sprach Zarathustra, which is defined by its cautious concern for man, and “Es sungen drei Engel” from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, a celebratory receipt of the Lord’s blessing. The programmatic narratives of Mahler’s First and Second Symphonies also convey encouraging messages of overcoming and achievement, in part through Mahler’s settings of various texts within each symphony. This unusual definition of ambition, a typically self-interested effort, was not unique to Mahler. The composer shared this reading with fellow members of the Pernerstorfer Circle, a group of young intellectuals who attended the University of Vienna in the 1870s. This group included the future leader of the Social Democrats Victor Adler and politician Heinrich Braun, whose conceptions of ambition were defined by their socialist credo. Also active in the group were the playwright and dramatist, Richard Kralik, who invoked the Übermensch as a religious ideal, and the writer Siegfried Lipiner, whose redemptive dramas contain allusions to Nietzsche’s Zarathustra. Considering the notion of ambition depicted in Mahler’s first three symphonies alongside the political writings of Adler and Braun, as well as the dramatic works of Kralik and Lipiner, reveals resonances among conceptions of benevolent ambition within Mahler’s circle in fin-de-siècle Vienna.