Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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Such faets as these reduce the so-called friendship
of his associates to its right level. With
his astonishing power of production the commonest
care would have ensured him a good
living ; and that no one of his set was found
devoted enough to take this care for him, and
exercise that watch over ways and means which
Nature had denied to his own genius, is a discredit
to them all. They prate of their devotion
to their friend, when not one of them had the
will or the wit to prevent him from starving ;
for such want as he often endured must inevitably
have injured him, and we cannot doubt
that his death was hastened by the absence of
those comforts, not to say necessaries, which
should have nursed and restored the prodigal
expenditure of his brain and nerves.
We are accustomed to think of Beethoven's
end as solitary and his death as miserable, but
what was his last illness compared to Schubert's ?
Officious friends, like Pasqualati, sending him
wine and delicacies ; worshipping musicians, like
Hummel and Hiller, coming to his death-bed as
if to a shrine ; his faithful attendants, Schindler,
Hiittenbrenner, and Breuning, waiting on his
every wish ; the sense of a long life of honour
and renown ; of great works appreciated and
beloved ; the homage of distant countries, expressed
in the most substantial forms—what a
contrast to the early death-bed, and the apparent
wreck of such an end as Schubert's ! Time has
so altered the public sense of his merits that it
is all but impossible to place oneself in the
forlorn condition in which he must have resigned
himself to his departure, and to realise
the darkness of the valley of the shadow of
death through which his simple, sincere, guileless
soul passed to its last rest, and to the joyful
resurrection and glorious renown which have
since attended it. Then an intelligent and wellinformed
foreign musician could visit the Austrian
capital and live in its musical circles,
without so much as hearing Schubert's name.'
Now memorials are erected to him in the most
public places of "Vienna, institutions are proud
to bear his name, his works go through countless
editions, and publishers grow rich upon
the proceeds even of single songs, while faces
hrighten and soften, and hands are clasped, as
we drink in the gay and pathetic accents of his
music.
For even his privations and his obscurity have
now been forgotten in the justice since done to
him, and in the universal affection with which
he was regarded as soon as his works reached
the outside world—an affection which, as we
have conclusively shown, has gone on increasing
ever since his death. In the whole range of
composers it may be truly said that no one is
I The allusion Is to B. HolmCB, the biographer of Hozart, who
paased some time in Vienna in the apring of 1827. evidently with
the view of flnding out all that was best worth knowing in music,
and yet does not mention Schubert's name. (See hisBamJAe among
(fte Muiiciaru ofQermany,)
SCHUBERT 333
now so dearly loved as he, no one has the happy
power so completely of attracting both the
admiration and the affection of his hearers.
To each one he is not only a great musician,
not only a great enchanter, but a dear personal
friend. If in his ' second state sublime ' he can
know this, we may feel sure that it is a full
compensation to his affectionate spirit for the
many wrongs and disappointments that he
endured while on earth.
The very wide field over which Schubertranged
in poetry has been more than once alluded to in
the foregoing. It would be both interesting and
profitable to give a list of the poems which he
has set. Such a list, not without inaccuracies,
will be found in Wurzbach's Biographisches Lexicon,
vol. xxxii. p. 94. Here we can only say
that it includes over 600 poems by 100 authors
of whom the principal are :
Goethe, 72 ; Schiller, 54 ; Mayrhofer, 48 ; W,
Miiller, 44 ; Hblty, 25 ; Matthisson, 27 ; Kose
garten, 20 ; F. Schlegel, 19 ; Klopstock, 19
Korner, 16 ; Schober, 15; Seidl, 15 ; Sails, 14
Claudius, 13 ; Walter Scott, 10 ;
Rellstab, 9
Uz, 8 ; Ossian, 7 ;
Heine, 6 ; Shakespeare, 3
Pope, 1 ; CoUey Gibber, 1 ; etc. etc.
Compared with the literature on other composers
that on Schubert is not extensive.
Biographical.—The original sources are scattered
in German periodicals and elsewhere.
1. The first place must be given to Ferdinand Schubert's
sketch, entitled Aus Franz Schuberts * Leben,'
four short papers which appeared in Schumann's periodical,
the Neue Zeitschrift fUr MvAik, in Nos. 3S to 86
(April 23-May 3), 1839. These are written with great
simplicity, and apparently great exactness ; but might
have been extended to double the length with great
advantage. 2. Mayrhofer contributed a short article of
recollections, Erinnerungeny to the Neues Archiv filr
Geschichte . . . Literatur umd KitTist (Vienna), Feb. 23,
1829 ; and Bauernfeld a longer paper, Ueber Fram Schubert,
to Nos. 69, 70, 71, of the iViener Zeitschrift filr
Kunst, Literatv/r, Theater, umd Mode, for June 9, 11, 1 3,
1829. These papers, written so shortly after Schubert's
death by men extremely intimate with him, are very
valuable. 3. Bauernfeld also made two interesting communications
to the Freie Pre-ise of Vienna, for April 17,
and 21, 1869, Containing six letters and parts of letters
by Schubert, and many anecdotes. These latter articles
were reprinted in the Leipzig Sigrtale for Nov. 15, 22, 26,
28, 1869 : translated in the Musical World, Jan. 8, 15,
Feb. 5, 19, 1870, and in Bauernfeld's GesamTmlte Schrifien,
vol. xii. (Vienna, 1873). But recollections written so
long after the event must always be taken cum grano.
4. Schindler wrote an article in Bduerle's Wiener Theaterzeitung,
for May 3, 1831, describing Beethoven's making
acquaintance with Schubert's songs on his death-bed;
and other articles in the Niederrheinische Musilaeitwng,
for 1857. He also mentions Schubert in his Life o/Itee(-
fcoUCTi, 3rd ed., ii. 136. 5. Schumann printed four letters
(incomplete), two poems, and a Dream, by Schubert, as
* Reliquien ' in his Neue Zeitschrift filr MusHc, for Feb. 1
and 5, 1839. 6. One of the same letters was printed
complete in the Signdle, No. 2, for 1878. 7. The Dia/ry
of Sofie Miiller (Vienna, 1832), the Unvergesseties of Frau
von Cheiy (Leipzig, 1858), and the Erinnerungen of her
son W. von Chezy (Schaifhausen, 1863), ail afford original
facts about Schubert by those who knew him ; and 8.
Perd. Hiller's KiinsUerlehen (Cologne, 1880), contains a
paper — ' Vienna 52 years since '
— embodying a few
interesting and lifelike notices of the year 1827. Of all
these, use has been made in the foregoing pages.
9. The first attempt to write a Ufe of Schubert was