United States or Dominica ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
An army captain cut him out with Fräulein d'Honrath; his good friend Stephan von Breuning won away from him the "schöne und hochgebildete" Julie von Vering, whom Beethoven loved and by whom he was encouraged; she married Stephan in 1808, and died eleven months later, after Beethoven had dedicated to her part of a concerto. He wrote a letter beautiful with sympathy to poor Stephan.
Beethoven opposed vehemently nearly every suggestion made by his well-meaning friends to remedy the defects of the book and score, but yielded at last and consented to the sacrifice of some of the music and a remodelling of the book for the sake of condensation, this part of the task being intrusted to Stephan von Breuning, who undertook to reduce the original three acts to two.
His mother died when he was young, and he found a foster-mother in Frau von Breuning, of Bonn.
Breuning, true to his sense of duty, not satisfied with having gained his point, endeavored, at the risk of antagonizing the master, to change the words "natural or testamentary heirs," to "legitimate heirs." Beethoven was obdurate on the point, however, saying, "the one term is as good as the other." Von Breuning, good faithful friend that he was, survived Beethoven but one year.
Stephen von Breuning, who was somewhat of a poet, and had considerable literary ability, was commissioned to make the desired changes in the libretto, cutting it down to two acts from three. The conference lasted until one in the morning, when, the point being gained, the Prince ordered supper to be brought in.
Another, and probably the correct one, is that Stephen endeavored to dissuade the master from adopting the young Karl in event of his brother's death. In either case Von Breuning acted entirely in Beethoven's interest without considering the possible consequences to himself; his disinterestedness was poorly rewarded however.
This conduct induced Breuning to place me in a pretty light to you and the house-steward, and also to send me a letter which I only answered by silence. I have not another word to say to Breuning. His mode of thinking and of acting, with regard to me, proves that there never ought to have been such friendly intimacy between us, and assuredly it can never more be restored.
The opera, however, was the most ambitious work he had yet attempted; to make it a success it was necessary that it be revised and altered considerably. With this object in view, Beethoven was invited by Prince Lichnowsky to meet some friends at his house to discuss the opera. The singers, Roeke and Meyer, who appeared in the cast, were of the party; also Stephen von Breuning and Sonnleithner.
My powers of discrimination enabled me to foresee the result with Breuning, for our modes of thinking, acting, and feeling are entirely opposite; and yet I believed that these difficulties might be overcome, but experience has disproved this. So now I want no more of his friendship! I have only found two friends in the world with whom I never had a misunderstanding; but what men these were!
Karl died shortly after, and a mistaken sense of loyalty toward his dead brother helped to keep alive Beethoven's anger against his former friend. There is no record of his having so much as mentioned the latter's name in the following ten years, although he and Von Breuning lived in the same city and had many friends in common.
Word Of The Day