Mozart: A Life in Letters: A Life in Letters (12 page)

It was now only a question of whether it was still possible to move the boy. The doctor said yes, because there was still no rash and it was not yet certain that it was smallpox.

At 4 in the afternoon Wolfgang was wrapped up in leather sheets and furs and lifted into the carriage, and in this way I drove with him to the cathedral deanery. On the 29th we saw a few small red pocks, but we doubted whether it really was smallpox as he was no longer very ill; and he took nothing but a powder every 6 hours […] and always scabious tea afterwards.

On the 30th and 31st –
his name day
– the smallpox came out completely […].
⁹

As soon as the smallpox came out, the fever went away and, thank God, he still felt well. He was very full, and, as he was amazingly swollen and had a thick nose, when he looked at himself in the mirror, he said:
I now look like little Mayr
, he meant the musician Mayr. Since yesterday the pustules have started to fall off; and the swelling went away 2 days ago.

You’ll see now that my motto is true:
in te Domine speravi, non confundar in aeternum
.
¹⁰

I leave it to you and the whole of Salzburg, too, to reflect on how strange it was that our fate drew us to Olmütz and how extraordinary it was that, of his own accord, His Excellency Count Podstatsky took us in with a child who was to develop smallpox. I need not tell you
with what kindness, graciousness and liberality we were waited on in every way; I should just like to ask how many people there are who would receive into their homes an entire family with a child in such a condition and to do so, moreover, from no other urge than their love of their fellow human beings? – – This deed will do Count Podstatsky no little credit in the life story of our little boy that I shall have printed when the time comes;
¹¹
to a certain extent it is here that a new era in his life begins.

I am sorry that I shall have to return to Salzburg later than I thought. Everyone will easily understand that at this time of the year I cannot set off again so soon and cannot undertake a long journey without further ado. I had barely heard that Herr Meissner was to go to Frankfurt when I resolved to be in Salzburg for the consecration
¹²
of our most gracious master, His Grace, but now there is no point as we cannot leave here so soon without endangering Wolfgang’s health. In the meantime, please have
3 Masses
said for us at the Holy Child of Loreto and
3 Masses
at Maria Plain. Herr Thomas, who visited us nearly every day when the illness was at its height, will tell you all about it.

Wolfgang and the rest of us send our best wishes to Herr Alterdinger. It has taken some time for him to achieve anything: but I hope that His Grace will not leave as useful a man as Herr Alterdinger with the barren subsistence of a valet de chambre
et fruges consumere nati!
¹³

I’ve received the letter with the enclosure from Monsieur Grimm in Paris. You’ll have seen from Monsieur Grimm’s letter what he writes about the Russian court and the hereditary prince of Brunswick; also how and in what company Herr Schobert went to meet his maker.
¹⁴
The two letters congratulating Herr Wolfgang have also arrived. Please continue to write to Herr Peisser.
¹⁵
Other people in Brünn and Olmütz have already written to me through him. Farewell. I and all of us send our best wishes to Salzburg, and I am your old friend.

Here is the reply to Herr Joseph that Wolfgang wrote in bed.
¹⁶
I am still worried that my little girl might get smallpox, for who knows whether the few pocks that she had were the right ones?

[
On the envelope
]

The 6 symphonies
¹⁷
that Herr Estlinger has copied must be rolled up neatly and handed to the mail coach with the address:
A Son Altesse S: S:
^me
Le Prince de Fürstemberg etc: aç Donaueschingen. I’ll write a letter to the prince from here. The concerto for two keyboards by Wagenseil should be added to the other printed sonatas
¹⁸
and sent to Herr Gessner in Zurich. You’ll see how awry everything has gone and how, when we thought that everything had turned out badly, God filled us with His great mercy and allowed our dear Wolfg. to recover from his smallpox. Nothing matters to me except that this is now behind us. I received another 30 ducats from Herr Peisser before leaving Vienna, and before I leave Olmütz I shall no doubt have to take as much from his friend, to whom he has referred me.
Basta!
Who knows who the father gives the white horse to! – – What do you say to Count Podstatsky’s behaviour towards us? – Does such a deed not deserve some sort of expression, if not of gratitude, at least of approval, from His Grace,
if not in person
, at least through his brother in Brünn or through Count Herberstein or at the very least by means of a letter from our Father Confessor or the court chancellor? Try and arrange this. I beg you.

The Mozarts remained in Olmütz until 23 December, returning to Vienna on 10 January 1768. On 19 January they had an audience with Empress Maria Theresa and Emperor Joseph II and at the end of the month, a few days after his twelfth birthday, Wolfgang began workon the
opera buffa
, La finta semplice
(‘The Pretend Simpleton’) K51.

Something for you alone!

It’s now time to give you a fuller and clearer account of our circumstances – whether fortunate or unfortunate, I do not know – and to hear your kind opinion. If money is man’s sole source of happiness, we are doubtless to be pitied because, as you know, we have spent so much that there is little apparent hope of our being able to recover it. But if health and skill in knowledge are man’s greatest possession, then – God be praised – we are still well off. We have survived the greatest and most dangerous storm; by God’s grace we are all well, and my children have certainly not forgotten anything but, as you’ll see, have made even greater progress.

Nothing, I know, will be more incomprehensible to you than how it is that our affairs have made so little progress. I’ll explain this to you as best I can, although I must omit things that cannot be entrusted to my pen. That the Viennese, generally speaking, have no desire to see serious and sensible things and have little or no idea about them, but want to see only foolish stuff, dancing, devils, ghosts, magic, buffoons, Lipperl, Bernardon,
¹
witches and apparitions is well known: their theatres prove this every day. A gentleman, even if he is bemedalled, will clap his hands and laugh till he is almost breathless at some bawdy harlequinade or silly joke, but at the most serious scene, the most moving and beautiful action, and the wittiest turns of
phrase, he will talk so loudly to a lady that honest people cannot understand a word. That is the main reason. The domestic arrangements at court, which I cannot describe here, are such that they have many consequences that it would take too long to explain here or to illustrate by means of examples. And this is the second reason. From these two reasons spring any number of oddities, because everything depends on pure blind chance but more often on some appalling baseness, which is not, however, typical of everyone, or even on some extremely brazen and daring boast. But to come to our own affair, many other adverse incidents have taken place. On our arrival, we had no choice but to obtain an entry to the court. But Her Majesty the Empress no longer maintains her own orchestra and goes neither to the opera nor to see plays: her way of life is so unworldly that it is impossible for me to describe it.
²
She referred us to the emperor, but as this gentleman absolutely loathes anything that might entail any expenditure, it took him a long time to reach a decision; meantime there was the sad event concerning the young princess and all the others incidents that you already know about from my letters. On our return from Moravia, we met their highnesses without really expecting to, for hardly had the empress been told what had happened to us in Olmütz and that we had returned when we were told the day and hour when we should appear. But what was the use of this astonishing kindness, this indescribable affability? What did it produce? Nothing but a medal which, it is true, is beautiful, but so worthless that I do not even care to put a value on it. She is leaving everything else to the emperor, who enters it in his book of things to be forgotten and no doubt thinks that he has paid us off with his most gracious conversation. You will ask me what the rest of the nobility in Vienna is doing. – – – What are they doing? – – They are all cutting back on their expenses, as far as is possible, in order to ingratiate themselves with the emperor. If their master is prodigal, then everyone follows suit; but if, conversely, he is frugal, everyone wants to run the most economical household.––––
As long as the carnival lasts, people here are thinking of nothing but dancing. There are balls wherever you turn, but always at public expense; even the
masked ball at court costs next to nothing
. And who benefits from this? – – –
The court!
For all the dances, masked balls, other balls and spectacles are leased. Others take the credit, and the profits are divided between the court and the lessee. And so everyone who attends them is doing the court a service. These, then, are the aristocracy’s political expenses. Among our patrons are the foremost members of the aristocracy: Prince
Kaunitz
, the
Duke of Braganza
, Fräulein von
Guttenberg
, who is the empress’s right hand, the chief equerry Count
Dietrichstein
, who can do what he wants with the emperor – these are our friends.
³
But, by sheer accident, we have not yet been able to speak to Prince Kaunitz, because he has the weakness to be so afraid of smallpox that he avoids people who still have red spots on their faces: as Wolfgangerl still has lots of red spots on his face which, it is true, are small but which are visible when it’s cold, he sent word through our friend
de Laugier
⁴
that he would see to our interests during Lent but that during the carnival it was impossible to get all the nobility together.

As I was weighing up this matter as best I could and thinking of all the money I had already spent and how it would be very foolish to go home now, without waiting for anything else to happen, something quite different occurred. I heard that all the keyboard players and composers in Vienna were opposed to our advancement, with the single exception of Wagenseil, but Wagenseil was ill at home and unable to help us or work to our advantage. The chief maxim of these people was to avoid most carefully every occasion of seeing us and admitting to Wolfgangerl’s abilities: and why?–––so that on the many occasions when they were asked whether they’d heard the boy and what they thought of him, they could always say
that they hadn’t heard him and that it couldn’t possibly be true: it was all a sham, a foolish trick, it was prearranged as he was given music that he already
knew, that it was absurd to think that he could compose etc. etc
. –––– That, you see, is why they’re avoiding us. For those who have seen and heard for themselves can no longer talk in this way without running the risk of losing face.

I managed to trick one of these people. We had arranged with someone to let us know in secret when he was there. He was to come and hand this person a really exceptionally difficult concerto that was then to be put before Wolfgangerl. And so we turned up, and he had the opportunity of hearing his concerto played by Wolfgangerl as if he knew it by heart. The astonishment of this composer and clavier player, the things that he said and the turns of phrase that he used in expressing his amazement made us realize the truth of what I said to you earlier. And finally he said:
As an honest man I can say only that this boy is the greatest man now living in the world. It was impossible to believe it
. – – – Now, in order to convince the public of what is involved here, I decided on a completely exceptional course of action, namely, to get him to write an opera for the theatre. – – – And what kind of an uproar do you think immediately arose among these composers? – – What? – Today we are to see a Gluck
⁵
and tomorrow a boy of 12 sitting at the harpsichord and conducting his own opera? – – – Yes, despite all those who envy him! I’ve even won Gluck over to our side or at least to the extent that, even though he is not entirely whole-hearted, he will not show it, for our patrons are also his, and in order to be sure of the performers, who usually cause the composer the greatest trouble, I have broached the matter with them, and one of them has given me all the ideas for the work. But, to tell the truth, it was the emperor himself who first gave me the idea of getting Wolfgangerl to write an opera in that he twice asked him if he’d like to write an opera and conduct it himself. Of course, he said yes, but the emperor could do nothing more as operas are the concern of Affligio.
⁶
The consequences of this undertaking – if God helps us to bring it off – are so great but also so easy to see that they require no
explanation. But I must not allow myself to regret spending any money, for I shall no doubt recoup it today or tomorrow. Fortune favours the brave. I must present things in the right light. We must succeed or fail! And what is more suitable for this than the theatre? But the opera won’t be given until after Easter, of course. I’ll shortly be writing for permission to remain here longer. – – – It’s not an
opera seria
, however, as no
opere serie
are being given at present and people don’t even like them, but an
opera buffa
.
⁷
Not a short
opera buffa
, however, but one lasting 2⅓ or 3 hours. There are no singers here for serious operas, even Gluck’s tragic opera
Alceste
was performed entirely by
opera buffa
singers. He too is now writing an
opera buffa
, as there are some excellent people here for an
opera buffa
: Sgr
Garibaldi
, Sgr
Caratoli
, Sgr
Poggi
, Sgr
Laschi
, Sgr
Pulini
, Sgra
Bernasconi
, Sgra
Eberardi
and Sgra
Baglioni
.
⁸
What do you say? Isn’t the reputation of having written an opera for the Viennese theatre the best way to gain credit not only in Germany but in Italy too? Farewell.