Abstract

Johann Wilhelm Ritter was a German physicist, philosopher, and chemist, who researched “invisible light” or the area beyond the visible light spectrum. Equal to his scientific interest in invisible light, Ritter was also fascinated with music, most especially the visualization of sound via the vibration plates of Ernst Chladni. This article presents Ritter’s musical esthetics in relation to the sound of nature in Carl Maria von Weber’s romantic opera Der Freischütz, which premiered in 1821 at the newly-built Königliches Schauspielhaus in Berlin. By connecting Ritter’s musical esthetics with that found in Der Freischütz, the opera can be seen as something more than a simple light work for entertainment or even a mere German nationalist text: an imaginative way of perceiving the inner workings of nature as a space of renewal and life-affirming certainty.

摘要

约翰·威廉·里特 (Johann Wilhelm Ritter) 是一位德国物理学家、哲学家和化学家，他研究“不可见光”或可见光谱以外的区域。除了对不可见光的科学兴趣，里特还对音乐着迷，尤其是通过恩斯特·克拉尼 (Ernst Chladni) 的振动板将声音可视化。本文介绍了里特在卡尔·玛丽亚·冯·韦伯的浪漫歌剧《自由射手》中与自然之声相关的音乐美学，该歌剧于 1821 年在柏林新建的 Königliches Schauspielhaus 首演。通过将 Ritter 的音乐美学与Der Freischütz中的音乐美学联系起来, 这部歌剧可以被视为不仅仅是一种简单的娱乐轻作品，甚至不仅仅是德国民族主义文本：一种将自然内部运作视为更新空间和肯定生命的空间的富有想象力的方式。