Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician, Volume 1

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Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician, Volume 1 (of 2)

Frederick Niecks

Third Edition (1902)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION (1888)
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION (1890)
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION (1902)
PROEM: POLAND AND THE POLES
CHAPTERS I-XIX

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

While the novelist has absolute freedom to follow his artistic
instinct and intelligence, the biographer is fettered by the
subject-matter with which he proposes to deal. The former may
hopefully pursue an ideal, the latter must rest satisfied with a
compromise between the desirable and the necessary. No doubt, it
is possible to thoroughly digest all the requisite material, and
then present it in a perfect, beautiful form. But this can only
be done at a terrible loss, at a sacrifice of truth and
trustworthiness. My guiding principle has been to place before
the reader the facts collected by me as well as the conclusions
at which I arrived. This will enable him to see the subject in
all its bearings, with all its pros and cons, and to draw his own
conclusions, should mine not obtain his approval. Unless an
author proceeds in this way, the reader never knows how far he
may trust him, how far the evidence justifies his judgment. For--
not to speak of cheats and fools--the best informed are apt to
make assertions unsupported or insufficiently supported by facts,
and the wisest cannot help seeing things through the coloured
spectacles of their individuality. The foregoing remarks are
intended to explain my method, not to excuse carelessness of
literary workmanship. Whatever the defects of the present volumes
may be--and, no doubt, they are both great and many--I have
laboured to the full extent of my humble abilities to group and
present my material perspicuously, and to avoid diffuseness and
rhapsody, those besetting sins of writers on music.

The first work of some length having Chopin for its subject was
Liszt's "Frederic Chopin," which, after appearing in 1851 in the
Paris journal "La France musicale," came out in book-form, still
in French, in 1852 (Leipzig: Breitkopf and Hartel.--Translated
into English by M. W. Cook, and published by William Reeves,
London, 1877). George Sand describes it as "un peu exuberant de
style, mais rempli de bonnes choses et de tres-belles pages."
These words, however, do in no way justice to the book: for, on
the one hand, the style is excessively, and not merely a little,
exuberant; and, on the other hand, the "good things" and
"beautiful pages" amount to a psychological study of Chopin, and
an aesthetical study of his works, which it is impossible to over-
estimate. Still, the book is no biography. It records few dates
and events, and these few are for the most part incorrect. When,
in 1878, the second edition of F. Chopin was passing through the
press, Liszt remarked to me:--

"I have been told that there are wrong dates and other mistakes
in my book, and that the dates and facts are correctly given in
Karasowski's biography of Chopin [which had in the meantime been
published]. But, though I often thought of reading it, I have not
yet done so. I got my information from Paris friends on whom I
believed I might depend. The Princess Wittgenstein [who then
lived in Rome, but in 1850 at Weimar, and is said to have had a
share in the production of the book] wished me to make some
alterations in the new edition. I tried to please her, but, when
she was still dissatisfied, I told her to add and alter whatever
she liked."

From this statement it is clear that Liszt had not the stuff of a
biographer in him. And, whatever value we may put on the Princess
Wittgenstein's additions and alterations, they did not touch the
vital faults of the work, which, as a French critic remarked, was
a symphonie funebre rather than a biography. The next book we
have to notice, M. A. Szulc's Polish Fryderyk Chopin i Utwory
jego Muzyczne (Posen, 1873), is little more than a chaotic,
unsifted collection of notices, criticisms, anecdotes, &c., from
Polish, German, and French books and magazines. In 1877 Moritz
Karasowski, a native of Warsaw, and since 1864 a member of the
Dresden orchestra, published his Friedrich Chopin: sein Leben,
seine Werke und seine Briefe (Dresden: F. Ries.--Translated into
English by E. Hill, under the title Frederick Chopin: His Life,
Letters, and Work," and published by William Reeves, London, in
1879). This was the first serious attempt at a biography of
Chopin. The author reproduced in the book what had been brought
to light in Polish magazines and other publications regarding
Chopin's life by various countrymen of the composer, among whom
he himself was not the least notable. But the most valuable
ingredients are, no doubt, the Chopin letters which the author
obtained from the composer's relatives, with whom he was
acquainted. While gratefully acknowledging his achievements, I
must not omit to indicate his shortcomings--his unchecked
partiality for, and boundless admiration of his hero; his
uncritical acceptance and fanciful embellishments of anecdotes
and hearsays; and the extreme paucity of his information
concerning the period of Chopin's life which begins with his
settlement in Paris. In 1878 appeared a second edition of the
work, distinguished from the first by a few additions and many
judicious omissions, the original two volumes being reduced to
one. But of more importance than the second German edition is the
first Polish edition, "Fryderyk Chopin: Zycie, Listy, Dziela, two
volumes (Warsaw: Gebethner and Wolff, 1882), which contains a
series of, till then, unpublished letters from Chopin to Fontana.
Of Madame A. Audley's short and readable "Frederic Chopin, sa vie
et ses oeuvres" (Paris: E. Plon et Cie., 1880), I need only say
that for the most part it follows Karasowski, and where it does
not is not always correct. Count Wodzinski's "Les trois Romans de
Frederic Chopin" (Paris: Calmann Levy, 1886)--according to the
title treating only of the composer's love for Constantia
Gladkowska, Maria Wodzinska, and George Sand, but in reality
having a wider scope--cannot be altogether ignored, though it is
more of the nature of a novel than of a biography. Mr, Joseph
Bennett, who based his "Frederic Chopin" (one of Novello's
Primers of Musical Biography) on Liszt's and Karasowski's works,
had in the parts dealing with Great Britain the advantage of
notes by Mr. A.J. Hipkins, who inspired also, to some extent at
least, Mr. Hueffer in his essay Chopin ("Fortnightly Review,"
September, 1877; and reprinted in "Musical Studies"--Edinburgh:
A. & C. Black, 1880). This ends the list of biographies with any
claims to originality. There are, however, many interesting
contributions to a biography of Chopin to be found in works of
various kinds. These shall be mentioned in the course of my
narrative; here I will point out only the two most important
ones--namely, George Sand's "Histoire de ma Vie," first published
in the Paris newspaper "La Presse" (1854) and subsequently in
book-form; and her six volumes of "Correspondance," 1812-1876
(Paris: Calmann Levy, 1882-1884).

My researches had for their object the whole life of Chopin, and
his historical, political, artistical, social, and personal
surroundings, but they were chiefly directed to the least known
and most interesting period of his career--his life in France,
and his visits to Germany and Great Britain. My chief sources of
information are divisible into two classes--newspapers,
magazines, pamphlets, correspondences, and books; and
conversations I held with, and letters I received from, Chopin's
pupils, friends, and acquaintances. Of his pupils, my warmest
thanks are due to Madame Dubois (nee Camille O'Meara), Madame
Rubio (nee Vera de Kologrivof), Mdlle. Gavard, Madame Streicher
(nee Friederike Muller), Adolph Gutmann, M. Georges Mathias,
Brinley Richards, and Lindsay Sloper; of friends and
acquaintances, to Liszt, Ferdinand Hiller, Franchomme, Charles
Valentin Alkan, Stephen Heller, Edouard Wolff, Mr. Charles Halle,
Mr. G. A. Osborne, T. Kwiatkowski, Prof. A. Chodzko, M. Leonard
Niedzwiecki (gallice, Nedvetsky), Madame Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt,
Mr. A. J. Hipkins, and Dr. and Mrs. Lyschinski. I am likewise
greatly indebted to Messrs. Breitkopf and Hartel, Karl Gurckhaus
(the late proprietor of the firm of Friedrich Kistner), Julius
Schuberth, Friedrich Hofmeister, Edwin Ashdown, Richault & Cie,
and others, for information in connection with the publication of
Chopin's works. It is impossible to enumerate all my
obligations--many of my informants and many furtherers of my
labours will be mentioned in the body of the book; many, however,
and by no means the least helpful, will remain unnamed. To all of
them I offer the assurance of my deep-felt gratitude. Not a few
of my kind helpers, alas! are no longer among the living; more
than ten years have gone by since I began my researches, and
during that time Death has been reaping a rich harvest.

The Chopin letters will, no doubt, be regarded as a special
feature of the present biography. They may, I think, be called
numerous, if we consider the master's dislike to letter-writing.
Ferdinand Hiller--whose almost unique collection of letters
addressed to him by his famous friends in art and literature is
now, and will be for years to come, under lock and key among the
municipal archives at Cologne--allowed me to copy two letters by
Chopin, one of them written conjointly with Liszt. Franchomme,
too, granted me the privilege of copying his friend's epistolary
communications. Besides a number of letters that have here and
there been published, I include, further, a translation of
Chopin's letters to Fontana, which in Karasowski's book (i.e.,
the Polish edition) lose much of their value, owing to his
inability to assign approximately correct dates to them.

The space which I give to George Sand is, I think, justified by
the part she plays in the life of Chopin. To meet the objections
of those who may regard my opinion of her as too harsh, I will
confess that I entered upon the study of her character with the
impression that she had suffered much undeserved abuse, and that
it would be incumbent upon a Chopin biographer to defend her
against his predecessors and the friends of the composer. How
entirely I changed my mind, the sequel will show.

In conclusion, a few hints as to the pronunciation of Polish
words, which otherwise might puzzle the reader uninitiated in the
mysteries of that rarely-learned language. Aiming more at
simplicity than at accuracy, one may say that the vowels are
pronounced somewhat like this: a as in "arm," aL like the nasal
French "on," e as in "tell," e/ with an approach to the French
"e/" (or to the German "u [umlaut]" and "o [umlaut]"), eL like
the nasal French "in," i as in "pick," o as in "not," o/ with an
approach to the French "ou," u like the French ou, and y with an
approach to the German "i" and "u." The following consonants are
pronounced as in English: b, d, f, g (always hard), h, k, I, m,
n, p, s, t, and z. The following single and double consonants
differ from the English pronunciation: c like "ts," c/ softer
than c, j like "y," l/ like "ll" with the tongue pressed against
the upper row of teeth, n/ like "ny" (i.e., n softened by i), r
sharper than in English, w like "v," z/ softer than z, z. and rz
like the French "j," ch like the German guttural "ch" in "lachen"
(similar to "ch" in the Scotch "loch"), cz like "ch" in "cherry,"
and sz like "sh" in "sharp." Mr. W. R. Morfill ("A Simplified
Grammar of the Polish Language") elucidates the combination szcz,
frequently to be met with, by the English expression "smasht
china," where the italicised letters give the pronunciation.
Lastly, family names terminating in take a instead of i when
applied to women.

April, 1888.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

The second edition differs from the first by little more than the
correction of some misprints and a few additions. These latter
are to be found among the Appendices. The principal addition
consists of interesting communications from Madame Peruzzi, a
friend of Chopin's still living at Florence. Next in importance
come Madame Schumann's diary notes bearing on Chopin's first
visit to Leipzig. The remaining additions concern early Polish
music, the first performances of Chopin's works at the Leipzig
Gewandhaus, his visit to Marienbad (remarks by Rebecca
Dirichlet), the tempo rubato, and his portraits. To the names of
Chopin's friends and acquaintances to whom I am indebted for
valuable assistance, those of Madame Peruzzi and Madame Schumann
have, therefore, to be added. My apologies as well as my thanks
are due to Mr. Felix Moscheles, who kindly permitted a fac-simile
to be made from a manuscript, in his possession, a kindness that
ought to have been acknowledged in the first edition. I am glad
that a second edition affords me an opportunity to repair this
much regretted omission. The manuscript in question is an "Etude"
which Chopin wrote for the "Methode des Methodes de Piano," by F.
J. Fetis and I. Moscheles, the father of Mr. Felix Moscheles.
This concludes what I have to say about the second edition, but I
cannot lay down the pen without expressing my gratitude to
critics and public for the exceedingly favourable reception they
have given to my book.

October, 1890.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

BESIDES minor corrections, the present edition contains the
correction of the day and year of Frederick Francis Chopin's
birth, which have been discovered since the publication of the
second edition of this work. According to the baptismal entry in
the register of the Brochow parish church, he who became the
great pianist and immortal composer was born on February 22,
1810. This date has been generally accepted in Poland, and is to
be found on the medal struck on the occasion of the semi-
centenary celebration of the master's death. Owing to a
misreading of musicus for magnificus in the published copy of the
document, its trustworthiness has been doubted elsewhere, but, I
believe, without sufficient cause. The strongest argument that
could be urged against the acceptance of the date would be the
long interval between birth and baptism, which did not take place
till late in April, and the consequent possibility of an error in
the registration. This, however, could only affect the day, and
perhaps the month, not the year. It is certainly a very curious
circumstance that Fontana, a friend of Chopin's in his youth and
manhood, Karasowski, at least an acquaintance, if not an intimate
friend, of the family (from whom he derived much information),
Fetis, a contemporary lexicographer, and apparently Chopin's
family, and even Chopin himself, did not know the date of the
latter's birth.

Where the character of persons and works of art are concerned,
nothing is more natural than differences of opinion. Bias and
inequality of knowledge sufficiently account for them. For my
reading of the character of George Sand, I have been held up as a
monster of moral depravity; for my daring to question the
exactitude of Liszt's biographical facts, I have been severely
sermonised; for my inability to regard Chopin as one of the great
composers of songs, and continue uninterruptedly in a state of
ecstatic admiration, I have been told that the publication of my
biography of the master is a much to be deplored calamity. Of
course, the moral monster and author of the calamity cannot
pretend to be an unbiassed judge in the case; but it seems to him
that there may be some exaggeration and perhaps even some
misconception in these accusations.

As to George Sand, I have not merely made assertions, but have
earnestly laboured to prove the conclusions at which I
reluctantly arrived. Are George Sand's pretentions to self-
sacrificing saintliness, and to purely maternal feelings for
Musset, Chopin, and others to be accepted in spite of the fairy-
tale nature of her "Histoire," and the misrepresentations of her
"Lettres d'un Voyageur" and her novels "Elle et lui" and
"Lucrezia Floriani"; in spite of the adverse indirect testimony
of some of her other novels, and the adverse direct testimony of
her "Correspondance"; and in spite of the experiences and firm
beliefs of her friends, Liszt included? Let us not overlook that
charitableness towards George Sand implies uncharitableness
towards Chopin, place. Need I say anything on the extraordinary
charge made against me--namely, that in some cases I have
preferred the testimony of less famous men to that of Liszt? Are
genius, greatness, and fame the measures of trustworthiness?

As to Chopin, the composer of songs, the case is very simple. His
pianoforte pieces are original tone-poems of exquisite beauty;
his songs, though always acceptable, and sometimes charming, are
not. We should know nothing of them and the composer, if of his
works they alone had been published. In not publishing them
himself, Chopin gave us his own opinion, an opinion confirmed by
the singers in rarely performing them and by the public in little
caring for them. In short, Chopin's songs add nothing to his
fame. To mention them in one breath with those of Schubert and
Schumann, or even with those of Robert Franz and Adolf Jensen, is
the act of an hero-worshipping enthusiast, not of a
discriminating critic.

On two points, often commented upon by critics, I feel regret,
although not repentance--namely, on any "anecdotic iconoclasm"
where fact refuted fancy, and on my abstention from pronouncing
judgments where the evidence was inconclusive. But how can a
conscientious biographer help this ungraciousness and
inaccommodativeness? Is it not his duty to tell the truth, and
nothing but the truth, in order that his subject may stand out
unobstructed and shine forth unclouded?

In conclusion, two instances of careless reading. One critic,
after attributing a remark of Chopin's to me, exclaims: "The
author is fond of such violent jumps to conclusions." And an
author, most benevolently inclined towards me, enjoyed the humour
of my first "literally ratting" George Sand, and then saying that
I "abstained from pronouncing judgment because the complete
evidence did not warrant my doing so." The former (in vol. i.)
had to do with George Sand's character; the latter (in vol. ii.)
with the moral aspect of her connection with Chopin.

An enumeration of the more notable books dealing with Chopin,
published after the issue of the earlier editions of the present
book will form an appropriate coda to this preface--"Frederic
Francois Chopin," by Charles Willeby; "Chopin, and Other Musical
Essays," by Henry T. Finck; "Studies in Modern Music" (containing
an essay on Chopin), by W. H. Hadow; "Chopin's Greater Works," by
Jean Kleczynski, translated by Natalie Janotha; and "Chopin: the
Man and his Music," by James Huneker.

Edinburgh, February, 1902.

PROEM.

POLAND AND THE POLES.

THE works of no composer of equal importance bear so striking a
national impress as those of Chopin. It would, however, be an
error to attribute this simply and solely to the superior force
of the Polish musician's patriotism. The same force of patriotism
in an Italian, Frenchman, German, or Englishman would not have
produced a similar result. Characteristics such as distinguish
Chopin's music presuppose a nation as peculiarly endowed,
constituted, situated, and conditioned, as the Polish--a nation
with a history as brilliant and dark, as fair and hideous, as
romantic and tragic. The peculiarities of the peoples of western
Europe have been considerably modified, if not entirely levelled,
by centuries of international intercourse; the peoples of the
eastern part of the Continent, on the other hand, have, until
recent times, kept theirs almost intact, foreign influences
penetrating to no depth, affecting indeed no more than the
aristocratic few, and them only superficially. At any rate, the
Slavonic races have not been moulded by the Germanic and Romanic
races as these latter have moulded each other: east and west
remain still apart--strangers, if not enemies. Seeing how deeply
rooted Chopin's music is in the national soil, and considering
how little is generally known about Poland and the Poles, the
necessity of paying in this case more attention to the land of
the artist's birth and the people to which he belongs than is
usually done in biographies of artists, will be admitted by all
who wish to understand fully and appreciate rightly the poet-
musician and his works. But while taking note of what is of
national origin in Chopin's music, we must be careful not to
ascribe to this origin too much. Indeed, the fact that the
personal individuality of Chopin is as markedly differentiated,
as exclusively self-contained, as the national individuality of
Poland, is oftener overlooked than the master's national descent
and its significance with regard to his artistic production. And
now, having made the reader acquainted with the raison d'etre of
this proem, I shall plunge without further preliminaries in
medias res.

The palmy days of Poland came to an end soon after the extinction
of the dynasty of the Jagellons in 1572. So early as 1661 King
John Casimir warned the nobles, whose insubordination and want of
solidity, whose love of outside glitter and tumult, he deplored,
that, unless they remedied the existing evils, reformed their
pretended free elections, and renounced their personal
privileges, the noble kingdom would become the prey of other
nations. Nor was this the first warning. The Jesuit Peter Skarga
(1536--1612), an indefatigable denunciator of the vices of the
ruling classes, told them in 1605 that their dissensions would
bring them under the yoke of those who hated them, deprive them
of king and country, drive them into exile, and make them
despised by those who formerly feared and respected them. But
these warnings remained unheeded, and the prophecies were
fulfilled to the letter. Elective kingship, pacta conventa,
[Footnote: Terms which a candidate for the throne had to
subscribe on his election. They were of course dictated by the
electors--i.e., by the selfish interest of one class, the
szlachta (nobility), or rather the most powerful of them.]
liberum veto, [Footnote: The right of any member to stop the
proceedings of the Diet by pronouncing the words "Nie pozwalam"
(I do not permit), or others of the same import.] degradation of
the burgher class, enslavement of the peasantry, and other
devices of an ever-encroaching nobility, transformed the once
powerful and flourishing commonwealth into one "lying as if
broken-backed on the public highway; a nation anarchic every
fibre of it, and under the feet and hoofs of travelling
neighbours." [Footnote: Thomas Carlyle, Frederick the Great, vol.
viii., p. 105.] In the rottenness of the social organism,
venality, unprincipled ambition, and religious intolerance found
a congenial soil; and favoured by and favouring foreign intrigues
and interferences, they bore deadly fruit--confederations, civil
wars, Russian occupation of the country and dominion over king,
council, and diet, and the beginning of the end, the first
partition (1772) by which Poland lost a third of her territory
with five millions of inhabitants. Even worse, however, was to
come. For the partitioning powers--Russia, Prussia, and Austria--
knew how by bribes and threats to induce the Diet not only to
sanction the spoliation, but also so to alter the constitution as
to enable them to have a permanent influence over the internal
affairs of the Republic.

The Pole Francis Grzymala remarks truly that if instead of some
thousand individuals swaying the destinies of Poland, the whole
nation had enjoyed equal rights, and, instead of being plunged in
darkness and ignorance, the people had been free and consequently
capable of feeling and thinking, the national cause, imperilled
by the indolence and perversity of one part of the citizens,
would have been saved by those who now looked on without giving a
sign of life. The "some thousands" here spoken of are of course
the nobles, who had grasped all the political power and almost
all the wealth of the nation, and, imitating the proud language
of Louis XIV, could, without exaggeration, have said: "L'etat
c'est nous." As for the king and the commonalty, the one had been
deprived of almost all his prerogatives, and the other had become
a rightless rabble of wretched peasants, impoverished burghers,
and chaffering Jews. Rousseau, in his Considerations sur le
gouvernement de Pologne, says pithily that the three orders of
which the Republic of Poland was composed were not, as had been
so often and illogically stated, the equestrian order, the
senate, and the king, but the nobles who were everything, the
burghers who were nothing, and the peasants who were less than
nothing. The nobility of Poland differed from that of Other
countries not only in its supreme political and social position,
but also in its numerousness, character, and internal
constitution.

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