“I have not seen Châteaubriand; he is in the country, but I will speak of your piece directly I do.”
“End of 1828.
“Do you know M. d’Eckstein, and can you give me an introduction to him? I hear that he is connected with a new and powerful paper,[6] in which Art is to be given prominence. If I am considered good enough, I should like to be musical correspondent. Help me if you can.”
Another landmark in my life was the reading of Goethe’s Faust; I could not lay it down, but read and read and read—at table, in the streets, in the theatres.
Although a prose translation, songs and rhymed pieces were scattered throughout, and these I set to music, then, without having heard a note of them, was crazy enough to have them engraved. A few copies, under the title of Eight Scenes from Faust were sold in Paris, and one fell into the hands of M. Marx, the great Berlin critic, who wrote most kindly to me about it. This unexpected encouragement from such a source gave me real pleasure, particularly as the writer did not dwell too much on my many and great faults. I know some of the ideas were good, since I afterwards used them for the Damnation de Faust, but I know, also, how hopelessly crude and badly written they were. As soon as I realised this, I collected and burnt all the copies I could lay hands on.
Under Goethe’s influence I wrote my Symphonie Fantastique—very slowly and laboriously in some parts, incredibly quickly and easily in others. The Scène aux Champs worried me for three weeks, over and over again I gave it up, but the Marche au Supplice was dashed off in a single night. Of course they were afterwards touched and retouched.
Bloc, being anxious that my new symphony should be heard, suggested that I should be allowed to give a concert at the Théâtre des Nouveautés.
The directors, attracted by the eccentricity of my work, agreed, and I invited eighty performers to help, in addition to Bloc’s orchestra. On my making enquiries about accommodation for such an army of executants the manager replied, with the calm assurance of ignorance:
“Oh, that’s all right. Our property man knows his business.” The day of rehearsal arrived, and so did my hundred and thirty musicians—with nowhere to put them!