Beethoven, George Alexander Fischer [best selling autobiographies .TXT] 📗
- Author: George Alexander Fischer
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The artistic temperament will account for these rhapsodies. Ill health in this period probably had as much to do with his lessened productivity as anything else. Schindler states that he had been on bad terms with his stomach for many years of his Vienna life. Confirmation of this is to be found in Beethoven's letters in which complaints about stomach and intestinal troubles are frequently met with in these years. These gastro-intestinal disturbances which so afflicted him had their origin in the chronic liver trouble to which he finally succumbed.
In the spring of 1812 he resolved by the advice of his physician to try the baths of Bohemia, and we find him at Töplitz, one of many notabilities, who were spending the summer at this place. Here he made the acquaintance of Goethe whom he held in great esteem. It was here also that he met Amalie Seebald of whom mention has already been made. She was a fine singer, and a beautiful, amiable woman of considerable talent. Beethoven wrote the following in her album:
Ludwig van Beethoven
Den Sie wenn Sie wollten
Doch nicht vergessen sollten.
Ludwig van Beethoven
Whom if you would
Forget, you never should.
It may be said in passing, that she was not the last to whom Beethoven yielded his susceptible heart. It would make a long list were it arranged chronologically, from the early Bonn days to his forty-fifth year.
Fac-simile of a letter from Beethoven to Amalie Seebald, written by Töplitz; during the summer of 1812. The autograph, from which the fac-simile is obtained, is in the Lenox Library, New York, and was photographed for this work by permission of the librarian.
An incident of his visit at Töplitz, showing Beethoven's humility and kindliness will bear narrating, as it was characteristic of the man. It relates to a stern parent, a lovely daughter, an ardent wooer. The first two characters of the dramatis personæ, were the innkeeper, at whose house Beethoven dined, and his daughter. The part of lover was taken by Ludwig Löwe, an actor, while Beethoven's part in the little drama is not much more important than that of scene-shifter. Löwe was a man in good standing, and came from a family of some prominence, but the father objected to him and forbade the daughter speaking to him. It appears that Beethoven was in the habit of coming late for dinner, so the plan was hit upon that Löwe was to take dinner late also, at which hour, the other guests having eaten and gone, and business being over for the time, the father was not apt to be around to interfere. "All the world loves a lover." Beethoven was an interested spectator of the little comedy, no doubt casting occasional friendly glances in the direction of the young couple. The father finally appeared on the scene, ordered the actor to leave the house, and forbade him coming there any more. At this crisis the lovers were in despair, that is for a while. Love laughs at locksmiths, as we know, and it had not got so far as that yet. Löwe, with the resources of a true lover, managed to meet Beethoven accidentally away from the inn, and looked at him so intently that he was rewarded by an answering nod of recognition from the master. The ice being broken, the actor disclosed his troubles. Meeting with sympathy, he was emboldened to ask him to deliver a letter to Fräulein Therese. To this Beethoven agreed, and, taking the letter, started to go, thus closing the interview. But Löwe was not so easily gotten rid of. With an embarrassed manner, he managed to convey to Beethoven the fact that there would be an answer. "So! And you wish me to deliver it? Well, meet me here to-morrow;" and so Beethoven became the go-between for the lovers during the remainder of his stay in Töplitz.
Allusion has already been made to the acquaintance which he formed with Goethe this summer. That Beethoven had the highest esteem for the poet, there is no doubt. In speaking of him in after years, he said, "Who can thank sufficiently a great poet? He is the most precious jewel of the nation" (kostbarste Kleinod einer Nation), which is much like Carlyle's remark on the great poet. "The appearance of such a man (Goethe) at any given era, is in my opinion the greatest thing that can happen in it. A man who has the soul to think and be the moral guide of his own nation and of the whole world." Goethe and Beethoven were on friendly terms and saw a good deal of one another during this summer. The acquaintance must have made a powerful impression on Beethoven. Goethe, the senior by many years, whose transcendent intellect had won him a world-wide reputation, was no doubt the cynosure of all eyes. Töplitz was full of notabilities. Thayer gives a long list of prominent persons, from royalty down, who sojourned there this summer. It must have been a very agreeable experience to the younger genius, whose fame had not yet penetrated much beyond Germany, this friendship. Had he possessed a tithe of the worldly wisdom of the elder man, and had regulated his conduct in accordance with the prejudices of the other, the friendship might have continued. Much as he desired this, it does not seem to have occurred to him to even try to make a good impression. Utterly lacking in self-control, he remained the same headstrong impulsive creature, while in Goethe's company, that he had always been. Whether or not the story is true of his meeting the Imperial family while with Goethe and disdaining even to answer their salutations, walking on and compelling the party to divide so as to give him the middle of the walk, while Goethe stood aside bowing low with uncovered head,—it is nevertheless more than probable that Beethoven showed his scorn for conventionality in numerous ways, thereby calling down on himself Goethe's disapproval. Born courtier that he was, it must have been mortifying in the extreme to him to be with Beethoven and witness his rudeness and contempt for appearances.
So far as known, Goethe never had anything more to do with him after this summer. On leaving Töplitz he writes to Zelter, Director of the Berlin Singakademie, mentioning Beethoven casually or as an afterthought, and alludes to him as an "entirely untamed (ungebändigt) person." From this time on, he seems to have excluded him from his thoughts. Beethoven's music was frequently performed at Goethe's house at Weimar. We read in "Eckermann's Conversations" that on such occasions the company would relate incidents from Beethoven's life, but Goethe never mentioned him.
Poet and musician were utterly dissimilar; it is not likely that either influenced the other to any appreciable degree. "It is a great folly," said Goethe in 1824 (Conversations with Eckermann) "to hope that other men will harmonize with us. I have never hoped this. I have always regarded each man as an independent individual, whom I endeavored to study, and to understand with all his peculiarities, but from whom I desired no further sympathy. In this way have I been enabled to converse with every man, and thus alone is produced the knowledge of various characters, and the dexterity necessary for the conduct of life." It was probably in this coldly analytical frame of mind, that the great councillor viewed the composer. But it was a momentous event to the latter to know Goethe. He had before this set to music a number of his ballads and had only recently composed the music to his Egmont. Many years afterward, in 1822, in an interview with Rochlitz who made a pilgrimage from Leipzig to make his acquaintance, he reverts to this time. "Since the Carlsbad summer when I met Goethe, I read him every day, that is when I do read. He has killed Klopstock for me, but Goethe he lives and he wants us all to live. This is why it is so easy to make music to his words."
CHAPTER IXThus, with what has hitherto been effected, the clue to the labyrinth of what is yet to be done is given us.
—Herder: Apotheosis of Humanity.
eethoven visited quite a number of places during the summer of 1812 in quest of health. While at Carlsbad he gave a concert in aid of the people of Baden, who had lost heavily through a disastrous fire there, on which occasion he extemporized. It seems to have been a success financially, but not artistically. In a letter to the Archduke he cites it as being "a poor concert for the poor." "Es war eigentlich ein armes Koncert für die Armen." This was owing to lack of time for rehearsals, and to the fact that only one other person, Herr Polledro, a violinist of Turin, took part in it. The concert was given within twelve hours from its inception, because many noteworthy guests were on the point of leaving town, and their presence was desired to insure a good attendance. The necessity must have been great to induce him to undertake it at all. His dislike for improvising for others was deep-seated, and was increased by his deafness.
In the fall we find him visiting his brother Johann at Linz, where he made quite a long stay. It was not alone Johann whom he was visiting; he had good friends there, among them Kapellmeister Glöggl, whom he saw nearly every day. At the latter's request the master composed three equali for trombones for All Souls' Day, then near at hand. These equali, as it turned out, were eventually used for Beethoven's funeral. The Kapellmeister's son, then a lad of fourteen, relates an incident of this time with Beethoven as the central figure. A resident of Linz, a certain Herr Graf von Dönhoff, who was a great admirer of Beethoven, gave an entertainment in his honor. After some of his music had been rendered by others, Beethoven was asked to extemporize, which he declined absolutely to do. Shortly after he disappeared. Supper being ready a search for him was instituted, but he was not to be found, so the company, after some delay, repaired to the adjoining room. They had hardly seated themselves at the table, when they heard some one at the piano. Gradually, one by one, they found themselves in the other room, where Beethoven was extemporizing. This he kept up for nearly an hour, when, suddenly coming to a realization of the circumstances, and looking around, he saw the entire company listening in rapt attention. He at once got up from the instrument and hastily left the room, either through anger or embarrassment. Such was his haste that he ran against a table containing fine porcelain bric-a-brac, which, of course, was shattered. The Count, with easy good nature, made some reassuring remark, upon which they all made another essay at the supper.
His object in going to Linz was not altogether for the purpose of making visits. A disagreeable duty had to be performed; Johann's relations with a young woman, whom he had taken as housekeeper, had become a scandal; the good repute of the family was at stake, and Beethoven went there with the express design of putting an end to the matter. Johann was not at all amenable to argument, and contested the
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