Anna Magdalena as Bach's Copyist

Among the wives of eighteenth-century composers, no one is perhaps more favourably and affectionately described than Bach's second wife, Anna Magdalena (1701-1760). She has been commonly pictured as her husband's trusted assistant, copying his works in handwriting which closely resembled her husband's beautiful calligraphy. No one appreciates her contributions more than today's musicologists, for her copies are usually 'neat and accurate', and are often among the most important primary sources when Bach's autographs do not survive. Occasionally, however, it is difficult to accommodate this patronising view of her role and its significance. It is well known, for instance, that her copy of Bach's Cello Suites (BWV 1007-1012) contains an unusually large number of inaccuracies and copying errors. One must ask how many of these blunders should be ascribed to her. How would a 'neat and accurate' copyist produce such an error-ridden manuscript if she had made it from a fair copy? In this paper, I shall first discuss Anna's copies of Bach's works, and see if any particular patterns or tendencies in her copying activities emerge when these are placed in this broader chronological context. In an attempt to evaluate her performance as a copyist, I shall look at typical situations in which she worked, while at the same time seeking to discover what additional values her copies may bring to our studies of Bach's life and works.

Art as an educative and social tool

Since remote times, certain sectors of society have been exposed to inequality and vulnerability, where adequate intervention processes have become conspicuous because of their absence. Nowadays, current societies have the responsibility of contributing, based on their experience and knowledge, with more efficient policies and programs that improve the life quality of the most disadvantaged. It is here where art and its different tools play a very important role, not only on a physical level, but also as an education tool that allows the development of emotional, mental and communicative skills. The aim of this paper is to make clear the potential of art as an instrument of social and educational intervention. It starts by showing worldwide-collected experience related to education and arts, and then, it acquaints the reader with two parallel intervention projects that worked with youths under social vulnerability conditions. These interventions were developed based on a qualitative research (Grounded theory), using as methodology “The Artistic Mediation” with emphasis on body language. This methodology helped researchers to get close to the participants and to know their experiences and emotions. At the same time, it was possible to evidence the positive effects of educative interventions through art. These workshops were based on an artistic methodology especially focused on body language. Data in this work is qualitative, and as such, it permits a special approach to the personal and emotional experiences of the participants; clearly showing the positive effects of the referenced practice on them.

'What say you to [this] book? Is it yours?'::Oral and Collaborative Narrative Trajectories in the Mediated Writings of Anna Trapnel

This article argues that, when a printed page is initially orally generated and then transcribed, either at the time or on a subsequent occasion by a listener or an interlocutor, there are important critical implications for the “I” of the account. It takes as a case study Anna Trapnel's first published works. Appearing within a few weeks of each other in 1654, The Cry of a Stone and Strange and Wonderful News are both mediated texts, large parts of which depend on the agency of a relater. The article begins by examining the textual traces of the relater, arguing for the centrality of his role and other agencies in the shaping of the works which bear Trapnel's name. Situating itself in relation to a current orientation in feminist autobiographical theory that places emphasis on the external requirement to narrate one's life, rather than on the spontaneous production of autobiography by an inner self, the article emphasizes notions of coaxing, witnessing and intersubjectivity to point up an appreciation of women's life writing as a species of cultural production in which various historical actors—male and female—participate. This dialogic process, which persists into the afterlife of transcription, owes part of its genesis to the political vagaries of 1654 and precipitates two contrasting—but equally “authentic”—versions of Trapnel's life and self. Mapping this movement, discussion concentrates on the ways in which a critical confrontation with women's oral narrative is as much an activity of disentangling as it is of reconstructing, an activity which is revealing of the extent to which a spectrum of social and cultural networks participates in and facilitates the female writing act.