Susanne K. Langer was one of the first women to pursue an academic career in philosophy in the United States and the first to receive both professional and popular recognition as an American philosopher. After writing one of the first introductory textbooks on symbolic logic, she turned her attention to a general study of symbolic forms--language, scientific knowledge, ritual, myth, and the arts--and their role in the formation of knowledge and experience under the influence of the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer. Her first book in that field, Philosophy in a New Key: A Study in the Symbolism of Reason, Rite and Art, was published in 1942 but became a best-seller when it was released in paperback six years later. It remains Langer's best-known work, especially among readers outside professional philosophy.

Philosophy in a New Key included a chapter on music, which Langer developed into a systematic and comprehensive philosophy...