Men of Faith: Stravinsky, Maritain and the Ideal Christian Artifex

Abstract

In this paper I explore the relationship and mutual influences between Stravinsky and Maritain. Despite the connections between these two men, and the prominence which Stravinsky at least still holds, scholars have neglected to examine their relationship in any depth. Although there is an abundance of recent scholarship on Stravinsky, most of it concentrates on Stravinsky during his Russian period, or on the workings of Stravinsky’s serial music divorced from its religious subject matter.8 I will demonstrate how Stravinsky met the criteria of Maritain’s ideal Christian artifex by analysing Canticum Sacrum (1955) through the lens of Maritain’s philosophy. One of Stravinsky’s major religious works, Canticum Sacrum was also one of his first works to use serialism. Although it is neither neo-classical nor from the period of Stravinsky’s rededication, it demonstrates not only how Stravinsky exemplified Maritain’s ideal, but that he continued to exemplify this ideal in his later works. While neither man changed his work to comply with the beliefs of the other, both Stravinsky and Maritain used each others’ writings – both musical and philosophical – to support and explain their methods, ideas and inspirations. Maritain’s enshrinement of Stravinsky as the prime living example of his artistic ideal boosted the popularity of his own philosophy, and Stravinsky ultimately lived up to the role of the ideal Christian artifex with pleasure, publicly describing himself in Maritain’s terms and finding a method of worship through his art that required no overt prostrations, only humble belief.