P.S. - If you see Count Tyskiewicz please repeat my invitation to
him to come for a couple of days to Weymar. If he is free next
Thursday, that would be a good day. We have a concert here at
which the "Kunstler-Chor" and a new orchestral work of mine ("Les
Preludes"), the Schumann Symphony (No. 4.), and his Concerto for
four horns will be given.
109. To Louis Kohler
My very dear Friend,
I come late - yet I hope you have not forgotten me. I am sending
you, together with this, the score and pianoforte arrangement of
my chorus "an die Kunstler," ["To the artists."] and also those
numbers of the Rhapsodies which have been brought out by
Schlesinger. The "Lohengrin" score you have no doubt received two
months ago from Hartel, whom I begged to send it you direct - also
the "Harmonies" from Kistner, and the last number of the
"Rhapsodies" from Haslinger. At the end of the year you shall get
some still greater guns from me, for I think that by that time
several of my orchestral works (under the collective title of
"Symphonische Dichtungen" [Symphonic Poems.]) will come out.
Meanwhile accept once more my best thanks for the manifold proofs
of your well-wishing sympathy, which you have given me publicly
and personally. You may rest assured that no stupid self-conceit
is sticking in me, and that I mean faithfully and earnestly
towards our Art, which in the end must be formed of our hearts'
blood. - Whether one "worries" a bit more or a bit less, as you
put it, is pretty much the same. Let us only spread our wings
"with our faces firmly set," and all the cackle of goose-quills
will not trouble us at all.
That your article has been rudely and spitefully criticized need
not trouble you. You presuppose your reader to have refinement
and educated feeling, artistic acuteness, a fine perception, and
a certain Atticism. These, my dear friend, are indeed rare
things - and only to be found in very homoeopathic doses among our
Aristarchuses. Sheep and d[onkeys] have no taste for truffles.
"Good hay, sweet hay, has not its equal in the world," as the
artist-philosopher Zettel very truly says in the "Midsummer
Night's Dream"! Moreover, dear friend, things didn't and don't go
any better with other better fellows than ourselves. We need not
make any fancies about it, but only go onward quietly,
perseveringly, and consistently.
"Lohengrin" will be given here on the Grand Duchess's next
birthday, April 8th. Gotze is coming this time from Leipzig, and
sings the part of the Knight of the Swan. I hope that in May
Tichatschek will undertake the role; he has already been studying
the complete work for a long time past, and has had a splendid
costume made for it. Perhaps you will be inclined to hear this
glorious work here either in April or May. That would be very
delightful of you, and I need not tell you how pleased I should
be to see you among us again.
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