From Maynard Solomon’s Beethoven: “For Beethoven’s German and Austrian contemporaries, the Napoleonic image was especially potent: Bonaparte’s admirers included Kant, Herder, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Schiller, Goethe, Hölderlin, Wielan, and Klopstock. Grillparzer, in his Autobiography wrote, ‘I myself was no less an enemy of the French than my father, and yet Napoleon fascinated me with a […]
Napoleon’s German admirers Read More »
One of the major, major pessimists in history. I quoted him earlier in the context of contemporary anti-humanism and those calling for human extinction. But lest we think of Arthur as always grim and cranky, here’s a delightful zinger. Schopenhauer, assessing Kant’s moral philosophy: “I should liken Kant to a man at a ball, who
Schopenhauer’s sense of humor Read More »
From an account of the famous meeting of the two giants in 1812: Beethoven’s manners were described as rough, like “an unlicked bear,” while “Goethe’s social attitudes were shaped in a more formal age. For Beethoven, 21 years his junior, the only true aristocrats were artists. In the mythology, his disillusionment was clinched by Goethe’s
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“Weary of liberty, he suffered himself to be saddled and bridled, and was ridden to death for his pains.” Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther.
The Fable of the Horse Read More »
A fascinating passage, reported by a young woman named Elizabeth Brentano,[1] who was a friend of Goethe and who met Beethoven in 1810. Here are Beethoven’s own words, according to Brentano: “When I open my eyes I must sigh, for what I see is contrary to my religion, and I must despise the world which
Beethoven on the metaphysics of music Read More »