Ludwig van Beethoven

The day-to-day exhausted me!

Karl von Baden, August 23, 1823, 1823

You will hear nothing of me here ... Fidelio? They cannot give it, nor do they want to listen to it. The symphonies? They have no time for them. My concertos? Everyone grinds out only the stuff he himself has made. The solo pieces? They went out of fashion long ago, and here fashion is everything. At the most, Schuppanzigh occasionally digs up a quartet.

Thayer 1967b, p. 801. (1822), 1822

The world is a king, and like a king, desires flattery in return for favor; but true art is selfish and perverse — it will not submit to the mold of flattery.

Conversations (March 1820), 1820

It is a recognised fact that the greatest composers were likewise the greatest virtuosos; but did they play like the pianists of the present day, who run up and down the keyboard with passages studied beforehand? Pooh! pooh! pooh! Don't tell me! A real virtuoso, when extemporising, plays pieces which hold together and possess a form. Were the ideas in them fixed instantly on paper, they would be taken for pieces written at leisure. That is what I call playing the piano; everything else is a bad joke.

24th November, 1814, 1814

One clashes with stupidity of all kinds. And then how much money must be spent in advance! The way in which artists are treated is really scandalous. I am compelled to give a third of my receipts to the manager of the theatre and a fifth to the hospitals. Devil take them! As long as these abuses exist, I shall always ask whether music is or is not an art that may be freely exercised. Believe me, there is nothing to be done for artists in times like these.

24th November, 1814, 1814

I met [Meyerbeer] at the performance of my "Battle." Most of the composers then in Vienna were kind enough to undertake something or other in my orchestra, and the young man played the big drum. Ha! ha! ha! (a peal of laughter). I had reason not to be very well satisfied with him. He was always behindhand, and I had to give it him roundly. (New peal of laughter.) He must have felt mortified by my observations; but there is no reliance to be placed in him; he has not the courage to raise his arm at the proper moment.

10th October, 1814, 1814

Do not merely practice your art, but force your way into its secrets; it deserves that, for only art and science can exalt man to divinity.

Letter to Emilie, July 17, 1812., 1812

Art! Who comprehends her? With whom can one consult concerning this great goddess?

Letter to Bettina von Arnim (11 August 1810), 1810

Music is the one incorporeal entrance into the higher world of knowledge which comprehends mankind but which mankind cannot comprehend.

As reported by Elizabeth Brentano (Bettina) in a letter to Goethe, 27 May 1810., 1810

Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy.

As reported by Bettina von Arnim in a letter to Goethe, 28 May 1810., 1810

...thus do I take my farewell of thee — and indeed sadly — yes that beloved hope — which I brought with me when I came here to be cured at least in a degree — I must wholly abandon, as the leaves of autumn fall and are withered so hope has been blighted, almost as I came — I go away — even the high courage — which often inspired me in the beautiful days of summer — has disappeared — O Providence — grant me at least but one day of pure joy — it is so long since real joy echoed in my heart — O when — O when, O Divine One — shall I find it again in the temple of nature and of men — Never? no — O that would be too hard.

Heiligenstadt Testament, 10 October 1802, 1802

I want to seize fate by the throat.

Letter to F.G. Wegeler, 16 November, 1801., 1801

There ought to be but one large art warehouse in the world, to which the artist could carry his art-works, and from which he could carry away whatever he needed. As it is, one must be half a tradesman.

Conversations (January 1801), 1801

Only the pure in the heart can make a good soup.

Music is like a dream. One that I cannot hear.