Goethe and Schubert: The Unseen Bond Book

"In every age there exists a secret bond between kindred spirits," said Robert Schumann. This book postulates such a bond of kinship between Goethe and Schubert, though they never met or communicated. Kenneth Whitton, a professor emeritus of European Studies at Bradford University, has written extensively on the German Lied; his knowledge about the two men's lives and works, and about German political and literary history, is encyclopedic. Whitton's first chapter is an account of the Lied before Schubert. The second deals with every aspect of Goethe's life, focusing on his relationship with the musicians of his time, notably his favorite song composers Zelter and Reichart, who allegedly most influenced his musical taste. The chapter also looks at Goethe's lifelong relationships with women, which, though egotistical, irresponsible, and reckless, led to exquisite love poems and guilt-inspired "self-confessional" writings. The chapter on Schubert, quoting both earlier "imaginative recreations" and recent scholarship, similarly dwells extensively on his amorous adventures, his drinking and smoking in bad company. However, Whitton also refutes some popular misconceptions, citing letters and contemporary accounts: Schubert, far from being an untutored rustic willing to compose any text regardless of quality, was well-read and discriminating in his literary tastes; and Goethe, far from being unmusical or insensitive to music, felt that music was indispensable to life and to poetry. Despite the artists' vast differences in social, financial, and personal circumstances, Whitton discovers factors that could, and should, have brought them together. For example, Goethe, who surprisingly wrote texts for several Singspiele, never found a composer to provide suitable music; Schubert, who always dreamed of writing an opera, never found a good librettist. Above all, Goethe's poetry had a profound influence on Schubert. It inspired his earliest and some of his best songs. He returned to it throughout his life, setting 80 poems to music, many of them several times. He was probably the first composer who truly understood them. Indeed, Whitton claims that Schubert's music made Goethe immortal--at least in non-German-speaking countries. Thus, Whitton's ultimate leitmotifs are "if only" and "what if." "What if" they had met? What would Goethe have made of Schubert's Lieder "if only" he had heard any of them? Much has been made of his returning a packet of them unopened, but few people seem to know that when Schumann visited Hamburg, Brahms, aged 17, sent him a package of his compositions, which was also returned unopened. The book's last and most arresting part is a detailed, critical analysis of all Goethe-Schubert Lieder, giving the background, as well as the often far-fetched subtext of the poems, and the dates and circumstances of composition. The English translations, like many others in the earlier chapters, are not always felicitous and are sometimes inaccurate, illustrating the problems faced by anyone who writes in one language about the literature of another. Since songs are meant to be heard rather than read about, the best way to compare various composers' Goethe settings is to listen to them. There are, of course, innumerable recordings of Schubert's Goethe settings (try Naxos's Schubert Lied Edition). Even many by Zelter, who has become famous mostly as Goethe's friend and Mendelssohn's teacher, are available on disc. Listen, and it soon becomes obvious that Schubert learned a lot from studying Zelter's songs (it is striking that Zelter used many inferior poems, while Schubert chose only the best). Of course, you can't go wrong with baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the dean of German Lieder singers. --Edith Eisler Read More