BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Thursday, July 7, 1825 (approximately)
Beethoven decides it would be a good idea to straighten some things out with banker Joseph von Henikstein, who has acted as financial agent for Prince Nikolai Galitzin in Vienna. In Conversation Book 90 at 30r, he starts to draft a letter: “To Henikstein: I request you to tell me what happened then with the bill of exchange, because my Brother does strange things with which I am not always satisfied.” Later, he writes, “The main thing is when the letter to Galitzin was sent.” 30r and 31r.
The final letter, probably written about today, survives and reads as follows: “I would very much like you to tell my Karl how things went with Prince Galitzin’s bill of exchange, namely whether you really could only give 215 florins, rather than 225 for it, for I am not always satisfied with my brother’s actions, and it would pain me if your reputation were to be hurt by it.”
“I would also like to know whether you did not receive a letter from Prince Galitzin dated April 29th to you personally, or whether you did not receive letter from him at all, since he wrote to me that he had also written to you.”
“Finally, I would ask you to kindly send a package to Petersburg, as it is too large to be sent by post. I am also having a new quartet written for the Prince, the sooner the better, the better for His Grace to receive this, but I find it somewhat cumbersome to do so by post.”
“I await your kind comments on this and, with the utmost respect, I am your most humble Beethoven.”
Brandenburg Letter 2002, Anderson Letter 1384 (misdated to May, 1825). The original is held in the Vienna City and State Library (I.N.5782). The package for Galitzin includes a copy of the Consecration of the House Overture, op.124, and the Name Day Overture, op.115, recently published by Steiner.
Beethoven also makes a few other miscellaneous notes interspersed with the letter draft. He makes a memo that he gave housekeeper Barbara Holzmann 7 florins 30 kreutzers to buy wine. He writes (mostly in French, but the last word in German) the aphorism, “There is no rule that one cannot break in the interests of beauty.” [Beethoven had made a similar comment in 1820, when he believed that publisher Johann Schickh had someone “correct” Beethoven’s song Abendlied unterm gestirnten Himmel, WoO 150, before he published it in the Wiener Zeitschrift.] Beethoven also writes a cryptic phrase in French, “leger avec c sera dessin un Faux 5 en ayant avec tre un belle 4.” [“light with it will be drawn a false 5, having along with it a beautiful 4.”] It’s possible this is a garbled quotation relating in some way to the French aphorism above.
Beethoven makes a note to buy sugar and coffee with Karl for the housekeeper. He writes another phrase half in French and half in German: “Jeunes qui coin Altist u ses merites u. zufällig ein Biederer Mensch.” [“Young people who know Altist and his merits and happen to be a decent person.”]
Finally, he makes an errand list for his upcoming trip into Vienna on Saturday, July 9:
- Soap powder
- Pension
- Razor, deliver immediately with the wine.
Conversation Book 90, 30r-31r.