Customer Reviews

Beethoven

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

How to describe Solomon's very good book on Beethoven? It is part psychohistory, which is always a perilous operation for a writer. I am one of those people who actually like Freud, but sometimes Solomon's psychoanalysis irritated me, and I was always glad when he left the couch and went back to more or less solid facts. There is a huge chapter on the Immortal Beloved that bored me after a couple of dozen pages, but those particularly interested in this aspect of Beethoven's life are in for a real treat! I'd like to have seen more discussion of B's politics and social views; Solomon's discussion of these is, overall, pretty thin.

But Solomon's weaknesses (and that is my judgment) do not ouweigh his great strengths. He has certainly done his homework on B's life, and he is a skilled writer and a patient, tireless researcher. He knows his Thayer as well, and he isn't above questioning long-held assumptions about this flawed but very great man. Solomon's discussion of B's music is sufficient for a biography (those who want a lot of details on the music should go elsewhere), and he does a great job of showing how the composer followed the classical models and broke away toward romanticism. He does well in showing the man's great genuis without ever worshipping him (the way 19th century music lovers did). No doubt about it, Beethoven was a real crumb in a lot of ways, and Solomon makes this clear.

As good as this book is, I wouldn't call it definitive. I imagine some bright peson coming along some day who has a deep understanding of the Enlightenment, of early romanticism, of music, and of German and Viennese society who will give a truer picture of the man in his full context. It is very difficult to describe music in words, but my imaginary writer will be adept at this as well. Until this person comes along (and we're talking about a reincarnation of Samuel Johnson or Shakespeare), Solomon will do just fine.

This is the second edition of Solomon's biography of Beethoven and it is an improvement in terms of both analysis and lucidity.

The book is written from a psychoanalytic point of view that all may not find convincing. However, the rudiments of Mr. Solomon's analysis, in terms of tracing Beethoven's life problems, his difficulties with women, with peers, and with himself to his childhood experiences probably transcends any specific psychological dogma and is insightful.

The book is a biography rather than an attempt at technical musical analysis. Even so, it elucidates the music well and with an obvious love for it. I found the discussion of Beethoven's final period works, and of his sometimes neglected vocal writings, particularly good.

The sections on Beethoven's relationship with Haydn, on his testament written upon the discovery of his impending deafness on the immortal beloved, and on his relationship with his nephew are all thoughtful and helped me better understand Beethoven.

A wonderful book for anybody who loves this composer or wants to learn more about why other people love him.

Sometimes it's necessary to read a book twice to really understand it. For me, neither an academic nor a musicologist, this is the case with Maynard Solomon's "Beethoven." When I first read it two tears ago, I saw it as "the best Beethoven biography I ever read...combining excellent writing, complete objectivity, and outstanding scholarship...maybe the best Beethoven biography ever." Now that I've read it again, (after also reading additional material Beethoven's life from other sources,) my opinion has changed. This time I found his attempts to psychoanalyze Beethoven annoying, and seemingly rooted more in conjecture rather than solid facts. Even the chapter on the Immortal Beloved, which I found so impressive the first time I read the book, seems now to me based more upon a process of elimination rather than solid scholarship.

Professor Solomon's prose is lively and entertaining, and his musical commentary may help non-academics and non-musicologists like myself better understand Beethoven's work. However, readers like myself, with a strong interest in Beethoven's life and music, may find other biographies (most notably Thayer's) that will better meet their needs.

I found this book impossible to put down! I'm neither a musicologist nor a professional musician and this book was still enjoyable as well as readable (didn't have to refer to other books for further elucidation of terminology). I found Mr. Solomon's style quite pleasant and his analysis insightful. Being a Psychiatrist, I easily become disinterested in amateur journalistic psychoanalysis. Mr. Solomon presented multiple theories to help explain a complex personality and his behavior. His reasoning is on target. This is a wonderful book, a story well told about a personality riveting from before his birth till after his death.

This is a great book if you want to learn about Beethoven's life. It gives you an idea of all the difficulties Beethoven had to overcome to become the great musician he is. Inspiring in itself.

The book organization is very well thought, describing first a particular period of Beethoven's life and then doing an analysis of the music in that particular period, showing how both relate to each other. That gives the reader a sense of unity and establishes a link between the life and the works of this master.

The contents of the book is very well researched. In fact, Solomon takes other biographies before his and goes deep into finding out the real facts. The research on the "Immortal Beloved" is great and there's a whole chapter dedicated to this mystery, which is very worth reading. And in the whole book, Solomon tries to split fact from fiction by going to the original sources and documents. That makes the book very accurate and because all evidence is shown, the reader can judge for himself.

This is definitelly THE BIOGRAPHY you want to read if you really want to know about Beethoven's life.

Maynard Solomon's 1977 biography "Beethoven" is divided into four main sections, "movements" so to speak, and every section is filled with themes and variations. Each section ends with an essay titled simply "The Music", in which is described the works Beethoven composed during the period under discussion. The interpretations are acute but easily understood by the non-musician. In fact, it could be that Solomon's book is the most reader-friendly of Beethoven biographies. (There are dozens.) Some of Solomon's revelations are surprising. For instance, the average reader does not think of Beethoven as a composer for voice, outside of "Fidelio" and the Ode to Joy, but Solomon states that "half of his 600 works are vocal". (Among other things, Solomon's description of "Fidelio"'s plot is fascinating.) Solomon also discusses how Beethoven's later works threatened to become travesties of his Herioc Style. In fact, "Wellington's Victory" was considered by professionals "a stupendous musical joke". Beethoven's difficult nature is legend, and Solomon deals with it frankly. Some of his irascibility was undoubtedly due to his deafness, which exacerbated after 1812. What caused the deafness is a little mysterious. The composer himself, in a rather weird anecdote, attributed it to an "excitement of rage", but the cause may have been more medically sound. Beethoven never married, and his "open" sex life consisted of flirtations with married women. (In fact, the 30-page account of the Immortal Beloved theorizes that she was a pretty Viennese matron whose affair with Beethoven eventually became an "exalted friendship".) His "secret" sex life, however, was his employment of prostitutes; and in his youth he was treated for syphilis. Did the contraction cause the deafness? Solomon doesn't go there, but he does indicate that Beethoven's morose treatment of other people was aggravated by the deafness. His brothers, for instance: the omission of Nikolaus Johann in the Heiligenstadt Testament and the shabby treatment of Kaspar Carl's widow and her son. Beethoven's gall could be incredible. Although he enjoyed "Il Barbiere di Siviglia", he warned Rossini not to attempt serious opera because it "ill suited the Italians. You do not possess sufficient musical knowledge to deal with real drama". Well, so much for Verdi (who was a child at the time). Of course, now, nearly 180 years after Beethoven's death, it's the music that matters. Even so, such a productive life can be appreciated on a literary level, and it's that experience that Maynard Solomon provides in this superlative biography.

I generally like psychologically profiling biographies (see my review of Rousseau: Restless Genius). BUT, that's conditional on the psychological analysis being done right.

Unfortunately, too often that is not the case in this book.

First, Solomon seems unaware that Freud has long been dethroned from being the king of psycholanalytic psychology, let alone psychology in general. Solomon could have made reference to many other ideas, themes and language from family systems therapy without referencing Freudian thought once.

Second, sometimes psychologizing can become overpsychologizing. This especially seems to be the case in dealing with Beethoven's relationship with nephew Karl.

Even worse, this can play out in putting much of that psychology through a sexual prism. Again, the Ludwig-Karl relationship, as analyzed by Solomon. To inject ideas of Ludwig's homoeroticism into this is rubbish.

It's stuff like that that gives psychoanalysis in general such a bad name, especially when practiced literarily.

I was first going to give this three stars, then backed off. I do think there's enough in it to merit two stars, but no more.

Agreeing with another critic of the book, I have to say Thayer's treatment of the material was certainly more thorough. Solomon interjects too much modern psychoanalytical interpretation into accounts, trying to form a pattern for some of Beethoven's actions, particularly with his nephew Karl. Far too much material about Beethoven's music is missing - the stories about his struggles with publishers, including Beethoven's joke he played by telling one that his latest quartet was taken from pilferings of other works, when he had promised him something completely new. It's not a particularly bad read, although I must admit that far too often I was reaching for the dictionary (give the thesaurus a rest, Mr. Solomon). As an introduction into the life of Beethoven, not bad. As the definitive biography of one of the world's most revered composers, I don't think so.

Not really a biography, more a lengthy attempt to psychoanalyze the composer. Surprisingly little about his actual life. BUT such things as a whole chapter about Solomon's guess (all "Beethoven Scholars" have one) as to the identity of the Immortal Beloved, to whom Beethoven wrote (but may not have mailed) an ardent love letter -- then no real attempt to make this supposed relationship relevant to the man's life and work. More fuzzy stuff about Beethoven's attempt to become guardian of his nephew. Spare me.

If this is the "definative biography of Beethoven," lord help us.

This incredibly well-written volume provides profuse information and reads like a novel. I could not get enough of it. Those reviewers who comment that the book is a work of psychohistory make a very valid point; yet it provides a new dimension in this composer's biography and breaks a person's otherwise reliance on Thayer and Schindler. I need see only that a work is authored by Maynard Solomon and I am sure to read it - I would enjoy listening to him as a guest on Coast-to-Coast-A.M.