III
Perhaps the most obvious element of his character was his essential innocence and simplicity, with all the curious secondary traits that accompany a nature fundamentally incapable of becoming sophisticated. Love of nature was one part of it. To an exceptional degree he loved to walk in the woods and to make long sojourns in the country. Lying on his back in the fields, staring into the sky, he forgot himself and his anxieties in a kind of ecstatic delight. Klober, the painter, writes: ‘He would stand still, as if listening, with a piece of paper in his hand, look up and down, and then write something.’ Not always was he quiet, but often strode impatiently along, humming, singing, or roaring, with an occasional pause for the purpose of making notes. In this manner dozens of sketch books were filled with ideas which enable the student to trace, step by step, the evolution of his themes. An Englishman who lived in intimate friendship with him for some months asserts that he never ‘met anyone who so delighted in nature, or so thoroughly enjoyed flowers, clouds, or other natural subjects. Nature was almost meat and drink to him; he seems positively to exist upon it.’ This quality is emphasized by Beethoven’s letter to Therese Malfatti, in which he says: ‘No man on earth can love the country as I do. It is trees, woods, and rocks that return to us the echo of our own thought.’ Like the Greeks, he could turn the dancing of the Satyrs into an acceptable offering on the altar of art. Of this part of his nature, the Sixth (Pastoral) Symphony is the monument. It is as if he took special occasion, once for all, to let speak the immediate voice of Pan within him. It is full of the sights and sounds of nature, not, however, as Beethoven himself says, a painting, but an expression of feeling. In an analysis of the allegro, referring to the constant repetition of short phrases, Grove says: ‘I believe that the delicious, natural, May-day, out-of-doors feeling of this movement arises in a great measure from this kind of repetition. It causes a monotony—which, however, is never monotonous—and which, though no imitation, is akin to the constant sounds of nature—the monotony of rustling leaves and swaying trees, and running brooks and blowing wind, the call of birds and the hum of insects.’ And he adds, as a summing up of its beauty: ‘However abstruse or characteristic the mood of Beethoven, the expression of his mind is never dry or repulsive. To hear one of his great compositions is like contemplating, not a work of art or man’s device, but a mountain, a forest, or other immense product of nature—at once so complex and so simple; the whole so great and overpowering; the parts so minute, so lovely, and so consistent; and the effect so inspiring, so beneficial, and so elevating.’
Another phase of this deep, unworldly innocence was the very exhibition of temper that so often brought him into trouble. Sophistication and conformity remove these violences from men’s conduct, and rightly so; often with them is also removed much of the earnestness, the spontaneous tenderness, and the trustfulness of innocence. What but a deeply innocent, unsophisticated mind could have dictated words like these, which were written to Dr. Wegeler, after a misunderstanding: ‘My only consolation is that you knew me almost from my childhood, and—oh, let me say it myself—I was really always of good disposition, and in my dealings always strove to be upright and honest; how, otherwise, could you have loved me.’ Together with this yearning for understanding from his friends was a consciousness also of genius, which was humble, the very opposite of vanity and self-conceit: ‘You will only see me again when I am truly great; not only greater as an artist, but as a man you shall find me better, more perfect’; and again, ‘I am convinced good fortune will not fail me; with whom need I be afraid of measuring my strength?’ This is the language of self-confidence, and also of a nature thoroughly innocent and simple.
Still another, and perhaps the most remarkable, phase of his character was a certain boisterous love of fun and high spirits, which betrayed itself on the most unexpected occasions, often in puns, jests, practical jokes, and satiric comment. He was, in fact, an invincible humorist, ready, in season or out of season, with or without decorum, to expend his jocose or facetious pleasantry upon friend or enemy. If he could deliver a home thrust, it was often accompanied with a roar of laughter, and his sense of a joke often overthrew every other consideration. Throwing books, plates, eggs, at the servants, pouring a dish of stew over the head of the waiter who had served him improperly; sending the wisp of goat’s hair to the lady who had asked him for a lock of his own—these were his sardonically jesting retorts to what he considered to be clumsiness or sentimentality. The estimable Schuppanzigh, who in later life grew very fat, was the subject of many a joke. ‘My lord Falstaff’ was one of his nicknames, and a piece of musical drollery exists, scrawled by Beethoven on a blank page of the end of his sonata, opus 28, entitled Lob an den Dicken (Praise to the fat one), which consists of a sort of canon to the words, Schuppanzigh ist ein Lump, Lump, Lump, and so on. Beethoven writes to Count von Brunswick: ‘Schuppanzigh is married—they say his wife is as fat as himself—what a family!’ Nicknames are invented for friend and foe: Johann, the Gutsbesitzer, is the ‘Brain-eater’ or ‘Pseudo-brother’; his brother’s widow is ‘Queen of the Night,’ and a canon written to Count Moritz Lichnowsky is set to the words, Bester Herr Graf, du bist ein Schaf! Often his humor is in bad taste and frequently out of season, but it is always on call, a boisterous, biting, shrewd eighteenth century gift for ridicule and jest.
It must be admitted, however, that he was usually blind to the jest when it was turned on himself. There is an anecdote to the effect that in Berlin in 1796 he interrupted Himmel, the pianist, in the midst of an improvisation, asking him when he was intending to begin in earnest. When, however, months afterward, Himmel attempted to even up the joke by writing to Beethoven about the invention of a lantern for the blind, the composer not only did not see the point but was enraged when it was pointed out to him. Often, however, the humorous turn which he was enabled to give must have assisted in averting difficult situations, and not always was his jesting so heavy handed. He speaks of sending a song to the Princess Kinsky, ‘one of the stoutest, prettiest ladies in Vienna,’ and the following note shows his keen understanding of the peculiarities of popular favorites. Anna Milder, a celebrated German singer, was needed for rehearsal. ‘Manage the affair cleverly with Milder,’ he writes; ‘only tell her that you really come in my name, and in advance beg her not to sing anywhere else. But to-morrow I will come myself in order to kiss the hem of her garment.’
Another phase of the essential simplicity, as well as greatness, of his mind is in his direct grasp of the central thought of any work. He overlooked incidental elements, in order to get at the fundamental idea. This quality, as well as his own innate tendency toward the heroic and grand, led him to such writers as Homer, Plutarch, and Shakespeare, and made it impossible for him to find any interest in trivial or frivolous themes. He was always looking for suitable subjects for opera, but could never bring himself to regard seriously such a subject as Figaro or Don Giovanni. The less noble impulses were not, for him, worthy themes for art. ‘He refused with horror,’ Wagner notes, ‘to write music to ballet, shows, fireworks, sensual love intrigues, or an opera text of a frivolous tendency.’
‘Mozart, with his divine nonchalance, snatched at any earthly happiness, any gaiety of the flesh or spirit, and changed it instantly into the immortal substance of his music. But Beethoven, with his peasant seriousness, could not jest with virtue or the rhythmical order of the world. His art was his religion and must be served with a devotion in which there was none of the easy pleasantness of the world.’[54] This same ability of grasping the fundamental idea, however, led him also sometimes to set an undue valuation upon an inferior poet, such as Klopstock, whom it is said he read habitually for years. Something in the nobility and grandeur of the ideas at the bottom of this poet’s work caused Beethoven to overlook its pompousness and chaotic quality. The words meant less for him than the emotion and conception which prompted them. Beethoven himself, however, says that Goethe spoiled Klopstock for him, but it was only, fortunately, to provide him with something better. His taste for whatever was noble and grand in art never left him; and, so far as he was able, he lived up to the idea that it was the artist’s duty to be acquainted with the ancient and modern poets, not only so as to choose the best poetry for his own work, but also to afford food for his inspiration.
Beethoven from the first faced the world with a defiant spirit and a sort of wild independence. His sordid childhood nourished in him a rugged habit of self-dependence, and the knowledge of his own powers was like a steady beacon holding him unfalteringly to a consciousness of his high destiny. He believed, with all the innocence of a great mind, that gifts of genius were more than sufficient to raise their possessor to a level with the highest nobility; and, with such a belief, he could not pretend to a humility he was far from feeling in the companionship of social superiors. This feeling was perfectly compatible with the genuine modesty and clearness of judgment in regard to his own work. ‘Do not snatch the laurel wreaths from Handel, Haydn, and Mozart,’ he writes; ‘they are entitled to them; as yet I am not.’ But his modesty in things artistic was born, after all, of a sense of his own kinship with the greatest of the masters of art. He could face a comparison with them, knowing full well he belonged to their court; but to courts of a more temporal nature he did not and could not belong, however often he chanced to come under a princely roof. The light ease of manner, the assured courtesies, the happy audacities of speech and conduct which are native to the life of the salon and court were foreign to his nature. The suffrage of the fashionable world of Vienna he won by reason of qualities which were alien to them, but yet touched their sympathies, satisfied their genuine love of music, and pricked their sensibilities as with a goad. His is perhaps the first historic instance of ‘artistic temperament’ dominating and imposing itself upon society. Byron to a certain extent defied social customs and allowed himself liberties which he expected to be excused on account of his genius and popularity; but he was fundamentally much more closely allied to the world of fashion than Beethoven, who was a law unto himself and in sympathy with society only so far as it understood and applauded his actions.
Theoretically, at least, he was an ardent revolutionist. During the last decades of the eighteenth century the revolution in France had dwarfed all other political events in Europe, and republicanism was in the air. Two years after Beethoven left Bonn the Electorate of Cologne was abolished, and during the succeeding period many other small principalities were swallowed up by the larger kingdoms. The old order was changed and almost all Europe was involved in warfare. In 1799 the allied European states began to make headway against the invading French armies, and, as a consequence, the Directory fell into disfavor in France. Confusion and disorder prevailed, the Royalists recovering somewhat of their former power, and the Jacobins threatening another Reign of Terror. In this desperate state of affairs Napoleon was looked to as the liberator of his country. How he returned in all haste from his victorious campaign in Egypt, was hailed with wild enthusiasm, joined forces with some of the Directors, drove the Council of Five Hundred from the Chamber of Deputies (1799) and became First Consul—in fact, master of France—need hardly be recounted here.
Beethoven regarded Napoleon as the embodiment of the new hopes for the freedom of mankind which had been fostered by the Revolution. That he had also been affected by the martial spirit of the times is revealed in the first and second symphonies. It was the third, however, which was to prove the true monument to republicanism. The story is one of the familiar tales of musical history. Still full of confidence and faith in the Corsican hero, Beethoven composed his great ‘Eroica’ symphony (1804) and inscribed it with the name ‘Buonaparte.’ A fair copy had already been sent to an envoy who should present it to Napoleon, and another finished copy was lying on the composer’s work table when Beethoven’s friend Ries brought the news that Napoleon had assumed the title of emperor. Forthwith the admiration of Beethoven turned to hatred. ‘After all, then,’ he cried, ‘he is nothing but an ordinary mortal! He will trample all the rights of man underfoot, to indulge his ambition, and become a greater tyrant than anyone!’ The title page was seized, torn in half and thrown on the floor; and the symphony was rededicated to the memory of un grand’ uomo. It is said that Beethoven was never heard to refer to the matter again until the death of Napoleon in 1821, when he remarked, in allusion to the Funeral March of his second movement, ‘I have already foreseen and provided for that catastrophe.’ Probably nothing, however, beyond the title page was altered. ‘It is still a portrait—and we may believe a favorable portrait—of Napoleon, and should be listened to in that sense. Not as a conqueror—that would not attract Beethoven’s admiration—but for the general grandeur and loftiness of his course and of his public character. How far the portraiture extends, whether to the first movement only or through the entire work, there will probably be always a difference of opinion. The first movement is certain. The March is certain also, as is shown by Beethoven’s own remark—and the writer believes, after the best consideration he can give to the subject, that the other movements are also included in the picture, and that the poco andante at the end represents the apotheosis of the hero.’[55]