Volume II Part 88 (1/1)

399 To Dr Eduard Hanslick

[The letter refers to Hanslick's notice of Liszt's book ”Les Bohemiens et leur musique,” in the Vienna Presse (the old one)]

Sir,

Experience having taught ard as a fate attached towhich does not instantly gather round it opinions as contrary as they are forcibly enunciated, I ah quite accusto themselves be influenced by this transitory impulse, desire to take into consideration what I have written, with sobriety and composure, just as you have done in your account of ed to you for having admitted that, if the requirements of my subject, and the opinion which after some twenty years of reflection I have formed of Bohemian hly imbued with a poetry which could only have been developed in a wandering nation, I have none the less endeavored to bring into pro for which this art is indebted to the coarians have always had for the music of Bohemia I desire in no way to diminish the merit of the works, while at the sa from them the expression of senti to them, however sympathetically they were associated therewith--

Still, the point which I notice first, in consequence of the very violent and premature attacks of which I have been the object, is not the one which I regard as the nify little to inally from India or Tartary That which has appeared to me worthy the study of an artist is this s it is destined to reproduce--It is in trying clearly to account for these latter that I have only found it possible to connect them with people placed in the exceptional conditions of the Bohelife would be (a question so often raised), that I have become convinced that it must be identical with that which breathes in the Art of the Bohemians This identity once ht to make it felt by and evident to my readers The better to succeed in this I have corroborated ether as a sort of complement various suppositions about the question of these sources But the scientific side of this question has never been, inbut very accessory; I should probably not have taken up the pen to discuss it If I have raised it, that has been the consequence, not the aim of my work Artist, and poet if you like, I a the poetical and psychological side of , with less fire and allurement possibly, but with more precision than music has done, some impressions which are not derived from science or poleination

Poetical and descriptive prose being little used in Germany, I can easily conceive that, on the announcement of the title of my book, a set of lectures, rather than a kind of poem in prose, will be expected I own that I would never have attempted to lecture on a subject the materials of which did not appear to me sufficient for this purpose How small a number of people,the little which it would be allowable to affirm in this case? Whilst the expression of the inners, whatever they be, froh to inspire an art, is never entirely unattractive, even to the more extended circle which includes not alone musicians, but all those who feel and wish to understandyou once more, Sir, for the perfect impartiality and clearness hich you have stated and criticised the co you to accept this expression of uished consideration

F Liszt

September 20th, 1859

END OF LETTERS OF FRANZ LISZT, VOL II