Customer Reviews

The Death of Franz Liszt: Based on the Unpublished Diary of His Pupil Lina Schmalhausen

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Alan Walker is generally recognized as the foremost authority on the great Franz Liszt, piano virtuoso, composer, and teacher, born in Hungary but claimed by all of Europe. After Walker's monumental three-volume biography it would have seemed that hardly more could be added to the Liszt tale; yet this slender book is an essential supplement.

Lina Schmalhausen was one of Liszt's lesser piano pupils and, from several accounts, not a human being of total integrity. She was openly despised by many in Liszt's inner circle of relatives, students and friends--Walker correctly warns the reader against taking all of her judgments at face value. Yet a genuine affection appears to have existed between her and the increasingly frail Liszt during his final years; certainly Schmalhausen was a devoted friend and caregiver (the jury remains out on whether there was an actual romantic attachment between the two), to whom the composer left some of his original manuscripts and other valuables. She visited him during his fatal journey to Bayreuth in the summer of 1886, and her firsthand written account of Liszt's last days on earth, in pain, largely immobile, racked by spasms of coughing, makes for harrowing reading. Even more painful is the indifference and incompetence of the relatives, servants, students and doctors who should have helped him and instead ignored him (his daughter Cosima, who was more preoccupied with running the festival of her late husband's work), or gave him incompetent medical advice and treatment that needlessly increased his suffering and may even have caused his death. Long suppressed and/or ignored by authorized Liszt scholars and biographers, Schmalhausen's diary has been edited, readably translated, extensively annotated (occasionally to excess, the only small drawback) and given a prologue and epilogue by Walker that sets the material in context.

This is a very accurate tale of Franz Liszt's final days. Walker's source is the diary of Liszt's student Lina Schmalhausen. Schmalhausen was a pupil, caregiver and confidante of Liszt in his last years. Her diary covers July 22, 1886, to August 3, 1886, the day of Liszt's funeral in Bayreuth. Its contents include the daily comings and goings around the dying Liszt and her very personal comments on events and many of the people involved. We hear from Liszt on topics such as his personal keepsakes, his students, human relations and romances. And, of course, the powerful figure of Cosima, Liszt's daughter and Wagner's widow of three years, is present throughout the book. She faced overseeing the performances and social events of the Bayreuth Festival while her dying father was close by. Schmalhausen gives a daily account of this situation. When I first got this book I thought, is the diary of Schmalhausen reliable? Walker does caution the reader to view her interpretation of the facts in the light of her relations with Liszt, Cosima and several other Liszt pupils, relations which he presents to the reader. Walker's prologue and epilogue gives a sad revealing look at friends and family of Liszt arguing over where he should be buried among other things. This is a wonderful book and I have read it many times. There are also eight black and white photos in the book. I think any one interested in Franz Liszt would enjoy this book.

My compliments to the reviewer "Klavierspiel" who captured the essence of the book and in passing also mentioned that it also bears the touch of what many [myself inclusive] consider to be "the" authority on Franz Liszt, Dr. Alan Walker. Just as a quick sidebar: It's my own view that Dr. Walker's quite excellent biographical trilogy is quite simply the definitive Franz Liszt. Keep alert for Amazon vendors offering the 'hardcover' 'used' editions of these otherwise pricey tomes [in hardcover] because with a little patience I was able to get literally mint hardcovers from 3 separate Amazon vendors for 'very' reasonable and greatly reduced from original hardcover list [no pun intended!] prices.

Anyway and the known 'sanitized' versions that exist of Liszt's demise not to mention the fact that Lina Schmalhausen herself was the object of some friction by others [simple envy that the 'master' took a liking to her .. and her care of him?] , but I go with the diary and Dr. Walker. And this too from someone who was 'there' which only adds, IMO, much credence to the matter with regard to the personal treatment of Liszt albeit of a 'non' medical nature by his own daughter, Cosima Wagner : Let the conductor, Felix Weingartner also speak, and I quote, "The Wagner family gave no outward sign of mourning. The daughters wore black dresses but that was all. We had confidently expected that at least one of the festival performances would be cancelled [...] If at least the flag on the roof of the theatre had been removed or hung at 'half-mast' [sic] ... But nothing, nothing at all was done to show outward reverence to his memory. Not even the receptions in the Villa Wahnfried were interrupted. Everything was made to look -- as if on purpose-- that Franz Liszt's passing was not of sufficient importance to dim the glory of the Festivals even temporarily by a veil of mourning. From that day on I never entered the portals of Wahnfried again." [sic -- "The Book of Musical Anecdotes", Norman Lebrecht, The Free Press, 1985 hardcover edition, p. 151].

Rather telling, I would say, or put another way, 'Der Stoff zum Nachdenken' [food for thought] in more ways than one! I think Dr. Walker should be commended for not just his own valuable contributions via his truly magnificent 3 volumes on Franz Liszt but also making this discovery of the unpublished Schmalhausen diary part and parcel of the Liszt biographical literature. And if the reader will bear with one additional sidebar: I'm still trying to figure out the literal jihad that Clara [Wieck] Schumann had later on in life with Franz Liszt. Another puzzler with all sorts of conjectured 'whys and wherefores' but nothing definitive there either save for the wags to call it a "cobra/mongoose situation" but the 'why' of it is still puzzling! But back to the Schmalhausen diary: to be colloquial about it, it's quite an eye-opener! And I thoroughly trust the source of the diary find, editor and examiner, Dr. Alan Walker.

Doc Tony

Any new publication edited by that pre-eminent Lisztian, Alan Walker, is a must read. Biography, musicology, Wagneriana, this book transcends any and all of these genres. The first wonderful surprise is that such a slim volume packs such an emotional wallop. But whose heart could remain cold in the face of revelations of the agonizing, lonely, somewhat unsung dying and death of the beloved master and humanitarian? One discovers that, were it not for the odd student--those few whose devotion held to the master artist/teacher and not to themselves (for being students of his master classes they were largely self-absorbed)--his final days went largely unmarked by the greater world. And yet he dies in Bayreuth in the bosom of the Wagners as he forces his failing body to honor the old friend, the discomforting son-in-law, and former colleague, Richard Wagner. The ironies--dramatic, pathetic, and historic--abound, and all the more for the naive, unselfconscious and informal yet blistering and passionate confessions of a young pupil to her diary. One can never regard Cosima quite in the same old way one has adopted, whether more Lisztian or Wagnerian after reading this work, which persuades and wins by Lina Schmalhausen's cognizance of the grave tragedy to which Franz Liszt's broken family renders him victim. It is, paradoxically, utterly uplifting, for the beauty of Liszt's spirit wins one utterly. And Walker's footnotes, far from pedantic, bring his authority to tilt one's personal inclination to feel as Lina feels.

For anyone interested in Franz Liszt this is a wonderful documentation of the details of his last few months. Ms. Schmalhausen recorded a daily diary of the activities of relatives/friends coming and going into his room as well as her own observations of his condition. She is opinionated and this is not an objective account but Alan Walker's commentary and explanatory notes provide invaluable insight to her writing and references to events that help to explain some of her comments. There is also a postscript about her own life which ended as a pauper without enough money for needed surgery--a sad end to both lives.

This is a relatively short book, but interesting to anyone researching Liszt at all.It's depressing to find such a great human being could be so coldly treated at a very vulnerable time of his life.The commentary by Mr. Walker is very interesting also.Not a fluid read, but noteworthy just the same.I guess these things happened to many people in history and were very much kept hush-hush for obvious reasons...