How to Transcend the Long-Standing Debate over “Novels Imitating Music”: A Review of Gerry Smyth’s Music in Contemporary British Fiction: Listening to the Novel

Journal of Literature and Music Studies

JLMS, Vol. 1, No. 1, 2026, pp. 86-90.

Print ISSN: 3134-8130; Online ISSN: 3134-8149

Journal homepage: https://www.jlmsjournal.com

DOI: https://doi.org/10.64058/jlwe260108tlsdn 

如何超越“小说模仿音乐”的旧争论[1]

——评格里·斯迈思的《英国当代小说中的音乐：倾听小说》

陈晨（Chen Chen）

摘要：格里·斯迈思的《英国当代小说中的音乐》是当代音乐与文学跨媒介研究的一次有益尝试。作者借助文化音乐学，揭示了当代英国小说如何通过音乐处理历史、怀旧、沉默与爱等主题，但由于其对音乐在小说中的社会使用与身份政治的强调，导致对小说在形式和结构上效仿音乐特性的分析相对薄弱。事实上，在理解音乐与小说的关系上，形式分析可以说是文化分析的基础维度，二者在批评实践中往往相互支撑。斯迈思的论述即是协调形式主义批评与文化历史主义批评的一个尝试。只有以整合代替对立，或许才能找到深化音乐—小说跨学科研究的新路径。

关键词：格里·斯迈思；《当代英国小说中的音乐：聆听小说》；形式主义；文化表征

作者简介：陈晨，博士后研究员，复旦大学。研究方向：音乐与文学跨学科研究、区域国别研究。电子邮箱：c_chen@fudan.edu.cn。

Title: How to Transcend the Long-Standing Debate over “Novels Imitating Music”: A Review of Gerry Smyth’s Music in Contemporary British Fiction: Listening to the Novel

Abstract: Gerry Smyth’s Music in Contemporary British Fiction represents a valuable attempt in the interdisciplinary study of music and literature. Drawing on cultural musicology, Smyth reveals how contemporary British fiction engages with themes such as history, nostalgia, silence, and love through music. However, due to his emphasis on music’s social use and identity politics, his analysis of how fiction formally and structurally imitates musical characteristics remains relatively underdeveloped. In fact, formal analysis can be seen as a foundational dimension of cultural analysis, and the two often support each other in critical practice. Smyth’s work is an attempt to reconcile formalist criticism with cultural-historical criticism. Only by replacing opposition with integration can we deepen interdisciplinary research on music and the novel.

Keywords: Gerry Smyth; Music in Contemporary British Fiction: Listening to the Novel; formalism; cultural representation

Author Biography: Chen Chen, Postdoctoral Fellow, Fudan University. Research: Interdisciplinary Research on Literature and Music, Area Studies. E-mail: c_chen@fudan.edu.cn.

 Received: 22 Mar 2026 / Revised: 12 Apr 2026 / Accepted: 20 Apr 2026 / Published online: 30 May 2026 / Print published: 30 Jun 2026.