Customer Reviews

Mozart's Letters, Mozart's Life

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Almost since the moment of his death in December 1791, people have been writing about W.A. Mozart, some of it accurate, but a great deal misguided, and false. Although I have enjoyed reading various Mozart biographies (Maynard Solomon's is my favorite), I found it quite refreshing to finally to sit down and read a collection of Mozart's own words. While the composer was somewhat a prankster in his younger days ( the "Eternal Child" stereotype unfortunately perpetuated by the film "Amadeus"), his letters undeniably demonstrate that Mozart was also a very thoughtful and passionate human being who enjoyed the highs and endured the lows of life, just like the rest of us. In this book, readers will get to know a man who wanted to be loved and lead a full life, only to die at the young age of 35!
Mozart's correspondence proves that for most of his life he sought a coveted position as a kappellmeister or court composer somewhere in Europe, which would mean a steady demand for compositions, as well as a handsome annual salary. In February 1778, he wrote to his father:
"I am a composer, and I was born a Kapellmeister. I must not and cannot bury my Gift for Composing, that a benevolent God has bestowed upon me in such rich a measure."
Despite his relentless determination, irrepresible spirit, and legendary talent as a performer and composer, Mozart never received the court post he so desperately desired, and this lack of a steady income pushed him deeper into debt during his last few years. Considering his financial problems and the other demands in his life, the quantity and quality of the work he produced during his final year is mind-boggling. Mozart's life was also marred by other tragic events; the gutwrenching letters describing his mother's death in Paris in 1778 are particulary moving, as are his emotional attempts to mend the strained relationship with his father after Mozart left Salzburg and moved to Vienna in the early 1780s. Perhaps most interesting of course, are Mozart's discussions of his art. My favorite quote of all comes from a letter of December 27, 1777, in which Mozart told his father as he sat at the organ, "The playing just flowed from my heart." To me, that one line captures why this remarkable human being and his timeless music still captivate us today. This book does not offer a completely rounded view of Mozart's life and times, but it is still a scholarly collection of Mozart's correspondence that will inspire and inform.

These letters are pleasing to read, a dignified but casual translation. Spaethling's commentary is never intrusive, always enlightening. It's fascinating to trace Mozart's maturity, his move away from his father, his flirtatiousness, sometimes erotic writing, with his wife. The preening and posturing show the genuis's very human side.

It will fascinate those who know nothing about Herr Mozart & intrigue those who know something already.
Robert Spaethling's translation of Mozart's letters, gets you to Meet Mozart with out adding nor taking away anything ! simply Amazing, A Must !!!!

This is a most welcome book, steeped in our age's current obsession of demythologizing Mozart and discovering the authentic historical truth of Mozart the man.

As late as 1938, Emily Anderson already had translated in English the Letters of Mozart and his Family using a beautiful, high-sounding polished English, which bore little resemblance to the real, natural style of Mozart, as has been strongly underlined by Robert Spaethling, the most recent translator of note of Mozart's Letters.
Spaethling rightly mentions that Emily Anderson made Mozart sound like his stiffly sententious and pedagogical father Leopold.
Emily Anderson cannot entirely be blamed, since the German edition used by her had already bowdlerized Mozart's own writings. Only in 1975 was completed for the first time a German edition of Mozart's letters in their original, natural language and style (by Bauer, Deutsch & Eibl, in 7 volumes, published by Bärenreiter Verlag, Kassel, 1962-1975.) This historical edition has not yet been translated into English in its entirety. This is where Spaethling came in.

Robert Spaethling, an American academic, born and raised in Bavaria where the local dialect is close to that of Salzburg, produced a new translation of Mozart's Selected Letters (2000, Norton & Co).
This new book is historically significant, and has contributed significantly to the job of cleaning up, for the English-speaking world, Mozart's image of its Romantic polish and any spurious connotations of a "divine" Mozart, so beloved by the 19th-century Romantics and Victorians.
Spaethling set himself the mission of preserving all the original colors, crudities, language games, and mannerisms of Mozart's natural style. Mozart was a superb and fun writer, with a lively and spontaneous style, unlike any other writer, and Spaethling is to be unreservedly admired and complimented for his unique success in rendering Mozart's colloquial German style in equivalent English.

Our only regrets are first, that the selected letters are often not completely translated, subjected, alas, to unwelcome cuts marked by ellipses, a breach of the promise made in the title "Mozart' Letters, Mozart's Life"; and, second, that Spaethling was discouraged from translating ALL of Mozart's letters -- which is a big shame -- in order to give his book a wider market.
Here we have the opposite of what was done in the English book translating the famous musical biography of Mozart by Hermann Abert (a 1,505-page magnum opus recently published by Yale in 2007), with dense text, pages heavily loaded, and an immensity of notes with microscopic font -- giving us immense value for money.
The Spaethling book on the contrary has large font, wide spacing, huge margins, little text per page -- in short it is afflicted with all the drawbacks of deceptive American packaging, aimed at making merchandise look more substantial than it really is.

And our vivid hope is that -- since Spaethling who now has abundant leisure time in retirement, and since he already has honed his skill in fashioning an acceptable English rendition of Mozart's natural German style -- he may seriously consider the logical extension of his last project in tackling the monumental job of fully translating Bärenreiter's seven volumes of the Complete Letters of Mozart and his Social Circle. This would give splendid meaning to the use of his retirement time and assure him a lasting place in Mozart's scholarship and research.

This new potentially complete translation by Spaethling, if it ever comes to publication, would be as valuable to us as the translation of Abert's Mozart.
Norton editor, please pass on this important message to Robert Spaethling. Nobody else but he can do this urgently needed job with the kind of quality and sureness of tone he's demonstrated in this book of Selected Letters.

This new, modern translation would restore the authentic style of the complete letters of Mozart and his Circle, and illuminate Mozart as a man anchored in his time and culture. The book should be about the same size as the original, and probably similar to the current Abert book on Mozart, 1,500 to 2,000 pages with the right font.
Together, the "great" Spaethling edition of the Complete Letters still to come, and the monumental book by Hermann Abert on "Mozart", would become the two fundamental texts of any future Mozart study.
Spaethling has a historical mission to accomplish thrown on his shoulders and we can only urge him to go ahead and accept this unique responsability.

ROO.BOOKAROO
March 6, 2010

For the vast majority of people, this translation will serve its purpose well. However, as someone studying Mozart on the graduate level, this translation does not serve the composer. It is fraught with too much contemporary garble, and censors much of the vulgarity that makes Mozart such a delightful psychological study. Of course, we can blame Nissen for starting this trend, but I was hoping for a translation that sought to reveal the man rather than continue to laud the legend.

Gave this book as gift to my mom for Christmas. I myself read some excerpts from the book and was surprised at some of the letters that were written. It is interesting to find out more information about someone you didn't know a lot about.

A splendid modern translation of the majority of Mozart's letters.
Also the transitional narratives are insightful.
Do not hesitate to purchase this.

The copy of this book arrived ahead of schedule, and the book was in pristine condition. I was extremely pleased with both the service and the shape of the book as well. I was happy to give it as a gift.

I found 'Mozart's Letters, Mozart's Life' a painstakingly detailed overview of the phenomenon called Mozart. Many references underwrote the comments made by the author and the letters were never boring for a second. Mozart's style is lively, his word usage innovative and in between the lines he gives valuable comments how he did it - i.e. write such music. the book provides a clear picture of Mozart's life, the conflicts he was involved in, his struggle for recognition and how the powers that be at the time shrugged him off. It is strange to see how little money he made on his works, against the estimated value of his collected copyrights of probably hundreds of millions of euros, or more.
D. Vos