Schubert at the Piano. From painting by Gustav Klimt.
"The subtle influence which Schubert exercised over those with whom he was brought into close contact was not to be accounted for by any grace of person or manner. Kreissle says that he was under the average height, round backed and shouldered, with plump arms and hands and short fingers. He had a round and puffy face, low forehead, thick lips, bushy eyebrows, and a short, turned-up nose, giving him something of a negro aspect. This description does not coincide with our ideas of one in whom either intellectual or imaginative qualities were strongly developed. Only in animated conversation did his eye light up, and show by its fire and brilliancy the splendour of the mind within. Add to this that in society Schubert's manner was awkward, the result of an unconquerable diffidence and bashfulness, when in the presence of strangers. He was even less fitted than Beethoven to shine in the salons of the Viennese aristocracy, for his capacity as an executive musician was more limited. But he was far more companionable among his intimate acquaintances, and perhaps his greatest, and certainly his most frequent, pleasure was to discuss music over a friendly glass in some cosy tavern. It would be entirely unjust to say that he was a drunkard, but he was not overcautious in his potations, and frequently took more than was prudent or consistent with a regard to health. This weakness was purely the result of his fondness for genial society, for he was not a solitary drinker, and invariably devoted the early portion of the day to work. The enormous mass of his compositions sufficiently proves his capacity for hard and unremitting labour, and no diminution of energy was observable to the very last. It is not easy for us at this distance of time, and with our colder Northern temperament, to comprehend the romantic feelings of attachment subsisting between Schubert and some of his friends,—feelings which, however, are by no means rare among the impulsive youth of South Germany,—but his naïve simplicity, cheerful and eminently sociable disposition, insensibility to envy, and incorruptible modesty, were qualities calculated to transform the respect due to his genius into a strong personal liking. Schubert was, in truth, a child of nature, one whom to know was to love; for his faults might be summed up into a general incapacity to understand his own interests, and it might be said of him as truly as of any one that he was no man's enemy save his own, thus reversing Shakespeare's words, the good which he did lives after him; the evil was interred with his bones."