Emotional Contagions: Franz Liszt and the Materiality of Celebrity Culture in the 1830s and 1840s

The chapter focuses on the materiality of emotions from the perspective of the rise of musical celebrities in the early nineteenth-century Europe. It concentrates on Franz Liszt and his affective gravitation, especially on his relationship with the active, often fanatic audience who participated in the performances and was ready to express openly its emotions. Heinrich Heine coined the term “Lisztomania” to describe the hysterical relationship of the audience towards the famous virtuoso. In many contemporary reviews Liszt’s emotional contagiousness and those mysterious powers that drew people towards him were intensively discussed. The chapter analyzes the materiality of emotions both from the perspective of the emotionality of the audience but also by focusing on how Liszt was interpreted as a generator of emotionality, as an assemblage of human and non-human forces. The chapter draws on a wide array of contemporary sources, newspapers and journals, images, letters and memoirs.