Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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366 1853- SCHUMANN -1854
So far as Brahms was concerned, it is true
that this brilliant envoi laid him under a heavy
debt of duty, in the necessity of measuring his
productions by the very highest standard ; and
at the time Schumann was supposed to have
attributed to Brahms, as he did to the poetess
Elisabeth Kulraann, giifts which he did not
actually possess. Twenty-eight years have
now [1881] passed and we know that Schumann's
keen insight did not deceive him, and
that Brahms verified all the expectations formed
of him. His intercourse with the young composer
(then twenty years old), in whom he took
the widest and most affectionate interest, was
a great pleasure to Schumann.
At that time, too, Albert Dietrich (afterwards
Hofcapellmeister at Oldenburg) was staying in
Dusseldorf, and Schumann proved to the utmost
the truth of what he had written only a few
months previously of Kirchner, that he loved
to follow the progress of young men. A sonata
for pianoforte and violin exists in MS. which
Schumann composed during this month (October
1853), in conjunction with Brahms and Dietrich.
Dietrich begins with an allegro in A minor
Schumann follows with an intermezzo inF major;
Brahms—who signs himself Joha/imes Kreissler
jwnior—swids an allegro (scherzo) in C minor ;
and Schumann winds up the work with a finale
in A minor, ending in A major. The title of
the sonata is worth noting. Joachim was
coming to Dusseldorf to play at the concert of
Oct. 27, so Schumann wrote on the title-page
'
In anticipation of the arrival of our beloved
and honoured friend Joseph Joachim, this sonata
was written by Robert Schumann, Albert
Dietrich, and Johannes Brahms. '
This interesting intimacy cannot have continued
long, since in November Schumann went
to Holland with his vrife, and did not return
till Dec. 22. But he met Brahms again in
Hanover in January 1854 at a performance of
' Paradise and the Peri,' where he found also
Joachim and Julius Otto Grimm. A circle of
gifted and devoted young artists gathered round
the master and rejoiced in having him among
them, little imagining that within a few months
he would be suddenly snatched from them for
ever.
Schumann's appearance was that of a man
his figure was above
but his
with a good constitution ;
the middle height, full and well-built ;
nervous system had always shown extreme excitability,
fend even so early as his twenty-fourth
year he suffered from a nervous disorder which
increased to serious disease. At a still earlier
date he had shown a certain morbid hypertension
of feeling, in connection with his passionate study
of Jean Paul, of whom he wrote, even in his
eighteenth year, that he often drove him to the
verge of madness. Violent shocks of emotion,
1 The HS. was iJD Joachlm'fi iMuession, and he permitted the
publication of the movement by Brahma, which appeared in 1907. .
as for instance the sudden announcement of a
death, or the struggle for the hand of Clara
Wieek, would bring him into a condition of
mortal anguish, and the most terrible state of
bewilderment and helplessness, followed by days
of overwhelming melancholy. A predisposition
to worry himself, an ' ingenuity in clinging to
unhappy ideas,' often embittered the fairest
moments of his Ufe. Gloomy anticipations
darkened his soul
'
; I often feel as if I should
not live much longer,' he says in a letter to
Zucoalmaglio of May 18, 1837, 'and I should
like to do a little more work ; '
and later, to
Hiller— 'man must work while it is yet day.'
The vigour of youth for a time conquered these
melancholy aberrations, and after his marriage
the calm and equable happiness which he found
in his wife for a long time expelled the evil
spirit. It was not till 1844 that he again fell
a prey to serious nervous tension. This was
evidently the result of undue mental strain, and
for a time he was forced to give up all work,
and even the hearing of music, and to withdraw
into perfect solitude at Dresden. His improvement
was slow and not without relapses ;
but in 1849 he felt quite re-established, as we
gather from his letters and from the work he
accomplished ; and his condition seems to have
remained satisfactory till about the end of 1851.
Then the symptoms of disease reappeared ; he
had, as usual, been again working without pause
or respite, and even with increased severity ; and
was himself so much alarmed as to seek a
remedy. Various eccentricities of conduct betrayed
even to strangers the state of nervous excitability
in which he was. By degrees delusions
grew uponhim, and he fancied thathe incessantly
heard one particular note, or certain harmonies,
or voices whispering words of reproof or encouragement.
Once in the night he fancied
that the spii-its of Schubert and Mendelssohn
brought him a musical theme, and he got up
and noted it down. He was again attacked
by that mortal ' anguish of mind ' of which he
had had former experience, and which left him
perfectly distracted. Still, all these symptoms
were but temporary, and between- the attacks
Schumann was in full possession of his senses
and self-control. He himself expressed a wish
to be placed in an asylum, but meanwhile worked
on in his old way. He wrote some variations
for the piano on the theme revealed to him by
Schubert and Mendelssohn, but they were his
last work, and remained unfinished. OnFeb. 27,
1854, in the afternoon, in one of his fits of
agony of mind, he left the house unobserved
and threw himself from the bridge into the
Rhine. Some boatmen were on the watch and
rescued him, and he was recognised and carried
home. Unmistakable symptoms of insanity
now declared themselves, but after a few days
a peculiar clearness and calmness of mind returned,
and with it his irrepressible love of