My Camp
... Christopher Isherwood's novel "The World in the Evening" (1954) includes a discussion of camp
Christopher Isherwood's 1954 novel The World in the Evening contains one of the first literary discussions of the concept of camp, distinguishing between Low Camp—a superficial, stereotypical caricature like a "swishy little boy with peroxided hair, dressed in a picture hat and a feather boa, pretending to be Marlene Dietrich"—and High Camp, which is characterized by underlying seriousness.
In the novel, the character Charles, an openly gay doctor, explains that High Camp is not mockery but a way of expressing something deeply serious—such as religion, love, or art—through fun, artifice, and elegance. He gives examples: Mozart, El Greco, and Dostoevsky are camp, while Beethoven, Flaubert, and Rembrandt are not. This definition emphasizes that true camp requires emotional investment and reverence, making it a sophisticated, ironic form of expression.
The discussion of camp in the novel has been widely recognized as foundational, with Susan Sontag later citing Isherwood’s treatment as the most significant early written account of the concept. The idea has since influenced cultural criticism, particularly in how gay identity, art, and emotional authenticity are expressed through exaggerated or stylized forms.
... isn't Pop art in general camp, and what are the criteria that define it?
Yes, Pop art is often considered camp, particularly due to its deliberate blurring of boundaries between "high" and "low" culture, its embrace of kitsch, and its ironic, exaggerated aesthetic. This alignment was especially prominent in the 1960s, when both Pop art and the concept of camp gained cultural visibility.
Criteria for Camp Inclusion (Based on Susan Sontag and Cultural Analysis)
1. Extravagance and Exaggeration
Camp values the over-the-top, the flamboyant, and the excessive. Sontag notes: “The hallmark of Camp is the spirit of extravagance.”
2. Irony and Detachment
Camp involves a playful, anti-serious attitude that dethrones traditional seriousness. It enjoys style over content and often treats serious subjects with frivolity.
3. Naïve vs. Deliberate Camp
Naïve (Pure) Camp: Art that is unaware of its own campiness (e.g., old sci-fi films taken seriously but now seen as absurd).
Deliberate Camp: Intentionally campy works (e.g., Andy Warhol’s art ~1965). Sontag preferred naïve camp, arguing that self-aware attempts often fail.
4. Failed Seriousness
Something becomes camp when it attempts seriousness but fails due to being too fantastic, passionate, or exaggerated—yet still commands admiration for its audacity.
5. Queer Sensibility and Subversion
Camp has deep roots in queer culture, functioning as a coded, subversive aesthetic that reclaims marginality. Pop artists like Andy Warhol and David Hockney infused their work with camp through ironic appropriation and gender play.
6. Recontextualization of the Mundane
Pop art transforms everyday consumer objects (soup cans, comic strips) into art—mirroring camp’s love of elevating the trivial.
7. Similarity to Kitsch
While kitsch is sincere bad taste, camp is ironic. Pop art sits at the intersection: it’s kitsch re-elevated through camp sensibility.
Examples in Pop Art
1. Andy Warhol’s repetitive celebrity portraits and disaster series embody camp through mechanical reproduction and emotional detachment.
2. James Rosenquist’s large-scale, advertisement-inspired paintings mix glamour and absurdity.
3. David Hockney’s stylized, fey male nudes reflect deliberate camp in their aestheticized homoeroticism.
... returning to Christopher Isherwood's separation of high and low camp, or that intended seriously - as distinct from the humorous type - the choice of Mozart and Beethoven is signal, as Mozart cannot be taken tragically even in serious forms such as his Requiem
Christopher Isherwood’s distinction between High Camp (serious, artful exaggeration) and Low Camp (superficial, stereotypical flamboyance) hinges on emotional sincerity beneath irony. His classification of Mozart as camp and Beethoven as not reflects this: Mozart’s music, even in serious forms like the Requiem, blends emotional depth with elegance, theatricality, and stylistic playfulness—hallmarks of High Camp. Though the Requiem deals with mortality and judgment, its expression is dramatized, stylized, and emotionally heightened, not purely tragic. The interplay of terror and beauty, ritual and operatic flair, aligns with camp’s love of artifice in service of serious themes. In contrast, Beethoven’s work—especially in pieces like the Eroica, or the Fifth Symphony—is often seen as earnest, monumental, and psychologically direct, lacking the ironic distance or decorative excess central to camp. Thus, Isherwood’s choice underscores that camp is not about triviality, but about expressing seriousness through stylization—and Mozart’s ability to infuse gravity with grace and theatricality makes him a quintessential High Camp figure.
... offer additional examples of classical composers who may be considered camp by today's standards
Based on Susan Sontag’s and later interpretations of camp, several classical composers and works are considered camp—either through stylistic extravagance, emotional theatricality, or ironic re-evaluation:
1. Richard Strauss
Sontag explicitly names Strauss’s operas as camp, particularly Salome, and Der Rosenkavalier. Their lavish orchestration, melodramatic plots, and gender-bending performances align with High Camp—serious artifice treated with reverence.
2. Giacomo Puccini
Operas like Turandot and Tosca are often seen as camp due to their over-the-top emotion, exoticism, and melodic excess. While intended seriously, their hyperbolic drama invites camp appreciation.
3. Carl Maria von Weber
His Der Freischütz blends supernatural themes with theatrical orchestration. The ritualistic Wolf’s Glen scene and Gothic horror tropes make it a candidate for naïve camp—earnest yet flamboyant.
4. Francis Poulenc
Musicologist Philip Brett identifies camp in Poulenc’s Concerto for Two Pianos, which fuses playful absurdity with jazz inflections and quasi-religious solemnity, embodying camp’s tension between frivolity and depth.
5. György Ligeti
Works like Le Grand Macabre and Adventures are deliberately surreal, blending grotesque humor, avant-garde technique, and operatic parody, making them modernist camp.
6. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
While Swan Lake and The Nutcracker are often labeled camp (per Sontag), this stems from later queer reinterpretations and ritualized performance styles, not composer intent.
... notable that Richard Wagner is not in the humorous category despite his bombastic overreach both in theme and public reception
Susan Sontag explicitly excludes Wagner from camp, stating: “the operas of Richard Strauss, but not those of Wagner.” For Sontag, camp requires a certain artificiality, theatricality, and ironic distance—qualities she finds in Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier but not in Wagner’s mythic, emotionally immersive works. Though Wagner’s operas are bombastic and grandiose, they are rooted in romantic seriousness, mythic depth, and philosophical ambition—qualities that resist the detached, playful irony central to camp. His art aims for transcendence, not stylized artifice. As Sontag notes, camp often thrives on failed seriousness, but Wagner’s seriousness is too total, too consuming to be camp—his works demand belief, not winking appreciation. That said, Wagnerian performance culture—especially in modern stagings (e.g., Nazi-themed Tannhäuser) or cult fandom—can become camp through excess or context, even if the music itself is not. The hyperbole, ritualism, and kitschy grandeur of some productions may border on camp, but this is external framing, not inherent quality.
... true, while reserving judgment on Wagner for his notable attempt at humor at Siegfried's discovery that Brünnhilde (in armor) is not a man -but a woman
Indeed, Wagner’s Siegfried contains moments of humor, particularly in Act III, where Siegfried’s discovery of Brünnhilde—armored and asleep—leads to the exclamation: “Das ist kein Mann!” (That is no man!). This moment, while rooted in dramatic revelation, carries comic irony due to Siegfried’s naïve assumption and sudden realization, and it often elicits laughter, especially in British performances. Though Wagner is not typically associated with humor, Siegfried balances serious mythic themes with lighter elements: physical comedy (the dwarf Mime’s antics), character flaws, and the hero’s childlike wonder. The opera has been described as the "Scherzo" of the Ring cycle, reflecting a playful, pastoral energy absent in the other operas. Thus, while Wagner himself may not be "camp" in Sontag’s sense, this specific moment and the opera’s tonal duality allow for camp-adjacent interpretation—where earnestness and absurdity coexist, and theatrical exaggeration invites ironic appreciation.
... the difference might be seen as one of intention, there being both intentionally humorous camp, as well as unintentionally humorous camp, leaving the listener to decide which is which
The distinction may well be in the author's conscious intention. Naïve (pure) camp is unintentional—serious works perceived as camp due to excess or failure (e.g., Puccini's, Bellini’s operas), even as deliberate camp is self-aware, knowingly exaggerated (e.g., The Rocky Horror Picture Show, John Waters’ films). Susan Sontag argued from the point of view of the audience, stressing that naïve camp is the more satisfying type, as both deliberate – and accidental examples - often fail by trying too hard. Ultimately, it is up to the audience to decide whether something is camp—and whether its humor is inherent or incidental.