Beethoven wrote the Heiligenstadt testament when he was taking a vacation from the busy life of Vienna in the Fall of 1802, a 31-year-old, brilliant and already-famous composer/virtuoso pianist par excellence. However, this was no happy vacation. Beethoven was coming face-to-face finally with his worsening deafness/tinnitus, consulting with all the doctors he could to see if someone could find a cure for his malady.
Unfortunately, the news was grim: nothing could be done; his deafness was only going to get progressively worse and worse with time. (Indeed in around 10 years time he was already completely deaf.) Naturally this brought up indomitable thoughts of suicide in the composer at his prime. Life had not treated him well, and now .... this . . .
ONLY ART IT WAS THAT SAVED HIM:
“I must live like an exile, if I approach near to people a hot terror seizes upon me, a fear that I may be subjected to the danger of letting my condition be observed - thus it has been during the past year which I spent in the country, commanded by my intelligent physician to spare my hearing as much as possible, in this almost meeting my natural disposition, although I sometimes ran counter to it yielding to my inclination for society, but what a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance and I heard nothing, or someone heard the shepherd singing and again I heard nothing, such incidents brought me to the verge of despair, but little more and I would have put an end to my life - only art it was that withheld me, ah it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt called upon me to produce, and so I endured this wretched existence - truly wretched, an excitable body which a sudden change can throw from the best into the worst state - Patience - it is said that I must now choose for my guide, I have done so, I hope my determination will remain firm to endure until it please the inexorable parcae to bread the thread, perhaps I shall get better, perhaps not, I am prepared.”
Important links
—
Wikipedia info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heiligenstadt_Testament
Complete English translation: http://www.lvbeethoven.com/Bio/BiographyHeiligenstadtTestament.html
Comments