I would never have in any way authorized any collection of my works (which, moreover, I consider premature) without previously consulting the publishers of single pieces, and ensuring that correctness in which editions of my individual works are so deficient. I must also observe that this illegal edition cannot be complete, as several new works of mine are shortly to appear in Paris, and these Herr Zulehner, being a French subject, dare not pirate. I intend to take another opportunity of enumerating the details of the collection of my works to be brought out under my own auspices and careful revision.
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.
31.
TO HERR RIES.[1]
1804.
Be so good as to make out a list of the mistakes and send it at once to Simrock, and say that the work must appear as soon as possible. I will send him the Sonata [Op. 47] and the Concerto the day after to-morrow.
BEETHOVEN.
[Footnote 1: Ries relates that the three following notes refer to the pianoforte Sonata, Op. 31, No. 1, carefully engraved by Nägeli in Zurich, which Beethoven consequently sent forthwith to Simrock in Bonn, desiring him to bring out "une édition très-correcte" of the work. He also states that Beethoven was residing in Heiligenstadt at the time the work was first sent [see No. 26]. In Nottebohm's Skizzenbuch von Beethoven, he says (p. 43) that the first notice of the appearance of this sonata was on May 21st, 1803; but Simrock writes to me that the date of the document making over the sonata to him is 1804.]
32.
TO HERR RIES.
I must again ask you to undertake the disagreeable task of making a fair copy of the errors in the Zurich Sonata. I have got your list of errata "auf der Wieden."