“ ... I have received a letter from Stassov urging me to present the following manuscripts to the Imperial Public Library:
(1) ‘Romeo and Juliet,’
(2) ‘The Tempest,’
(3) ‘Francesca,’
(4) ‘The String Quartet, No. 3,’
and any others I like to send. Of the above works you do not possess the first two (‘The Tempest’ was lost long ago!), but please send him the others.... Be so good as to reply personally, or simply to send such scores as you can spare.”
To M. Tchaikovsky.
“Paris, December 3rd (15th), 1884.
“I can scarcely tell you, dear Modi, how wearisome the last few days have been—although I cannot say why. It proceeds chiefly from home-sickness, the desire for a place of my own; and even the knowledge that I start for Russia to-morrow brings no satisfaction, because I have no home anywhere. Life abroad no longer pleases me.... I must have a home, be it in Kamenka, or in Moscow. I cannot go on living the life of a wandering star.... Where will my home be?”
With the year 1884 closes the second period in Tchaikovsky’s artistic career. To distinguish it from the “Moscow period,” which was inseparably connected with his teaching at the Conservatoire, it might be described as the “Kamenka period.” Not only because from 1878-84 Kamenka was his chief place of residence, but still more because the life there answered to the whole sum of his requirements, to all which characterised his spiritual condition during these years. After the terrible illness in 1877 he found in Kamenka, far more than in San Remo, Clarens, or France, all he needed for his recovery; during these seven years, it was at Kamenka that he gathered force and recuperated for the life which was becoming infinitely more strenuous and many-sided.
Those who have been at death’s door often speak of their return to health as the happiest time in their lives. Tchaikovsky could say the same of the first years of the Kamenka period. Happy in the friendship of Nadejda von Meck and surrounded by his sister’s family, who loved him, and whom he loved, his whole life shows no gladder days than these.
But with a gradual return to a normal state of mind Tchaikovsky’s relations to his environment underwent a change. As the years went on, Kamenka became too narrow a circle for him; he felt the want of “social intercourse”; the sympathy of his relations ceased to be the one thing indispensable; the conditions of the family life palled, and sometimes he grumbled at them. By the middle of the eighties, he was so much stronger that he was possessed by a desire for complete independence and liberty of action. He no longer dreaded either absolute solitude, or the society of those whose interests were identical with his own. By absolute solitude we do not mean that solitary leisure which he enjoyed during his visits to Brailov and Simaki, during which he was cared for, as in a fairy tale, by the invisible hand of the truest of friends, but rather that independence and freedom in every detail of existence which constitutes the solitude of the typical bachelor’s life.
In 1878 Tchaikovsky’s dread of this kind of solitary existence, like his fear of social intercourse, was a symptom of his terrible mental suffering. Now his desire for both independence and society must be regarded as a sign of complete recovery. Hence his increasing disposition in his letters to grumble at Kamenka, and his final decision to leave it. This resolve—like so many important decisions in Tchaikovsky’s life—was not the result of mature reflection. As usual, he allowed himself to be guided by negative conclusions.... He knew well enough that he must and would change his manner of life; he knew the kind of life that would suit him for the time being—that it must be in the country; he observed with surprise his increasing need of social intercourse—but he had no definite idea how he should reconcile these contradictory requirements and, on the very eve of his new departure in life, he asks the question: “Where will my home be made?”