Mozart's letters
Wolfgang Amadé Mozart was a very productive letter writer throughout his life. He wrote numerous letters to friends, acquaintances and superiors, but above all to his family. His father Leopold Mozart is considered to be his most frequent correspondent . Mozart's letters are among his most important extra-musical legacies, as they document his travels, projects, relationships, attitude to life and musical works. Today the letters are the basis of various Mozart biographies and treatises.
First postscript
Between the ages of thirteen and sixteen, Mozart mainly wrote postscripts . On a trip through Italy with his father , he added postscripts to some of his father's letters to the wife and daughter he had left behind, addressed to his sister Maria Anna (mostly called Nannerl ). He reported mostly in Italian, German, sometimes a combination of both or several languages. The letters have a narrative character and convey Mozart's travel pictures. The following letter (freely translated from Italian) is considered one of the first postscripts to his sister:
“ Wörgl , December 14, 1769
Carissima sorella mia. We are happy to have arrived in Wörgl, praise and thanks to God, and if you want to hear the truth, I'll tell you: the trip was pleasant, I wasn't cold at all and in our carriage it's as warm as in a room. What is your sore throat doing? [...] When you see Herr von Schiedenhofen, tell him that I always sing Tralaria, Tralaria, and also tell him that he doesn't need to throw any more sugar in the soup, I'm no longer in Salzburg [...] Now I'm hungry and want to eat. Keep yourself sane. Addio. Wolfgang Mozart "
Even in these first letters, Mozart's inclination towards elaborate presentation is evident. In another postscript, for example, he told Nannerl in detail about an opera he had just seen. Here he switched from Italian to German in the middle of a sentence. Several letters addressed to his sister were written on the trip mentioned above.
Letters as a teenager
From around the age of 16 Mozart began to write longer letters with increasing frequency. From Italy to his sister or mother Anna Maria Mozart . At the age of 18 mainly to his father, from whom he was now separated. He also had a lively correspondence with his cousin, Maria Anna Thekla Mozart . During this time, Mozart's writing style was sometimes characterized by his affinity for gadgets such as mirror-inverted writing, unusual rhymes and, above all, fecal words. This is also illustrated by the following letter to his cousin, "his Bäsle":
“Mannheim, November 5, 1777
Dearest bäsle häsle! I have received this valuable letter correctly, and I can see from it that the H: cousin savior, who has fr: baass, and they like, are quite well up; We are also, praise God and thanks, quite healthy dog. [...] "
Mozart signed this letter with "Wolfgang Amadeus Rosenkranz ". In letters to his father, however, Mozart rarely writes jokingly and only does so on a high level.
For a long time, the Bäsle letters were only cited in fragments. The accumulation of jokes, anarchy, and coarse-forceful tones could not be reconciled with the glory of genius and contemporary prudish morality. Later one fell into the other extreme and interpreted most of Mozart's utterances psychoanalytically as metaphors of repressions, the result of excessive demands in early childhood, or narcissistic self-centeredness.
Letters as an adult
As he got older, Mozart wrote less and less to pen pals, but more and more letters to his father. The correspondence with his cousin came to an end. Mozart wrote frequently to his wife Constanze Mozart about this , especially during the travel-related separations. In a letter to his father, Mozart describes death as the “best and most sincere friend of mankind” and the “key that unlocks true happiness for us”.
“I never go to sleep without considering that I might not live to see the next day, and yet none of my acquaintances could say that I am stubborn or cross with them - and thank you for this source of happiness I to my Creator every day and I wish the same for my fellow human beings with all my heart. "
Last letter
Mozart wrote his last letter on October 14, 1791.
“At 6 o'clock I picked up Salieri and the singer Cavalieri by car and led them into the box […] Salieri listened and watched the opera with all attention and from the symphony to the last chorus there was not a piece that they did not like ,Bravo!' or 'Bello!' elicited. And they could almost not finish to thank me for this favor [...] "
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart died just two months later at the age of 35.
Style and shape
Mozart's sometimes rather crude expression is probably due in part to his mother's language use. For example, on September 26, 1777, she wrote to her husband and daughter:
"I win a good night, shit in beth that cracks, it's already over oas now can rhyme yourself: sh ..."
Mozart's letter was, however, very correct because he never forgot to give the address, date and place. He always referred to his father as “mon très cher père” (“my very dear father”) and his wife as “dearest, best female”.
In the envelope of a letter that the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg purchased in 2020, there is an extensive postscript by Mozart on the inside. It is written in a crude language and describes his idea of a Bölzlschießen target.
literature
- Willi Reich (Ed.): Mozart's letters , Manesse Verlag, Zurich 1991, ISBN 3-7175-1296-X
- Jean-Jacques Greif: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Bertelsmann, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-570-12742-7 .
- Wilhelm A. Bauer, Otto Erich German: Mozart. Letters and Notes. Complete edition in 7 volumes, ed. from the International Mozarteum Foundation Salzburg, Kassel a. a. 1966-75, ISBN 3-7618-0401-6 .
Web links
- Letters from Leopold Mozart and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on the Baden State Library website
- Letters and notes on WA Mozart and his family from the holdings of the Mozarteum Foundation Salzburg
Individual evidence
- ^ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Maria Anna Thekla Mozart. Reinhard Ermen (Ed.): Wolfgang Amadeus writes to Maria Anna Thekla Mozart ... and I remain the fool. CH Beck, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-406-34762-2 , p. 60.
- ^ Joseph Heinz Eibl, Walter Senn (ed.): Mozart's Bäsle letters. Bärenreiter / dtv, Kassel / Munich 1978, ISBN 3-423-04323-7 .
- ^ Hanns-Josef Ortheil: Mozart's Bäsle-Briefe, an essay. In: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Maria Anna Thekla Mozart, Reinhard Ermen (ed.): Wolfgang Amadeus writes to Maria Anna Thekla Mozart ... and I remain the fool. CH Beck, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-406-34762-2 , p. 11 u. 12.
- ↑ Juliane Vogel (Ed.): The Bäsle-Briefe (= Reclams Universal-Bibliothek; No. 8925). Reclam, Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-15-008925-5 .
- ↑ "He definitely did not have Tourette's syndrome" . In: Die Zeit , February 12, 2020.