What Literature Imagines about Music:Comparing Fictionalisations of Western Music in The Ground Beneath Her Feet and The Time of Our Singing

What role does music play in Western culture? How do listeners experience different types of music? Literature can nuance such questions about uses and experiences of Western music through medial affordances, for instance, fictionalisation and narrative construction. This chapter analyses musical themes in literature as part of a shared, social 'imaginary' of music. It compares the theme of music in The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999) by Salman Rushdie with The Time of Our Singing (2003) by Richard Powers. Bridging intermedial Word and Music Studies with cultural Sound Studies, the chapter argues that fiction can be an 'earwitness' that reflects, contributes to, or challenges established conventions about Western music. Comparing the novels' fictionalisations of popular music and art music, respectively, the chapter points to an apparent shared paradox in the two novels: music is at the same time imagined as both universal and industrial. Based on the analytical examples, the chapter suggests that literary imaginaries of music can offer an alternative music discourse to nuance current debates within Cultural Musicology.