Cindy Gieringer wrote:

>A few weeks ago, while on holidays in Vienna, I picked up a brochure
>about Mozart's last home.  This was the place where he composed the famous
>Requiem Mass, and also where he died.  When I got there, all I saw was a
>department store.  I went in to ask for directions, and saw a Mozart store,
>selling mugs, stationary, etc.  with the words Mozart on them.  It was then
>that I realized they had torn down Mozart's house, and built a department
>store instead!  I couldn't believe it- I thought that was totally
>ridiculous.

My wife and our then 8-year old daughter visited Vienna about 24 years ago
and we did get to see the apartment in which Mozart lived at the end of his
life.  It was easily missed if you didn't know it was there, just a (truly)
small apartment in a large building...and I'm hoping Cindy just missed it,
but I fear she may not have and it has now really been replaced by a
department store.

The common wisdom now is that Mozart, while a spendthrift heavily in debt,
did not die impoverished, and was a well-paid musician (earning more money
than Schiller and, I believe, Haydn) who prided himself on the possession
of a billiard table.  One would hardly gather this from viewing his last
apartment, however.  It was pitifully small.  To have been in the rooms
where Mozart walked and sat and talked and sang and ate and drank and
slept and composed, gave me a *frisson* similar to what I suspect might
be experienced by some when visiting the historic holy sites in the Middle
East.

Walter Meyer