Liszt's "Poisoned" Song: Examining the Versions and Poetic Interpretations of Vergiftet sind meine Lieder

If readers peruse the catalogue of Liszt’s songs in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, they will notice that several works exist in multiple versions. These variants differ in their degree of similarity, ranging from near copies of the original to completely new text settings. Scholars continue to document the challenges these different versions pose for performers and scholars alike. Some studies provide cursory observations about alterations to melodic, harmonic, and formal features while others detail stylistic changes among the revisions.1 Most important are studies that account for more than general characteristics by exploring Liszt’s “developing vision” for a work via his revisions.2 A teleological view of Liszt’s output, tracing his