Rachel Ehrenberg writes:
>But will I ever be able to listen to the opera's of Wagner, to Strauss who
>was from my beloved Bavaria without feeling dirty?
Probably not. We have been too infected with the 20th century events to
ever be able to return to more innocent days, believing that civilization
will triumph and ethics and morality will take us into a better world.
Alas not so.
Daily we read of atrocities in Europe, America and in Asia and Africa.
Only Australia and Antarctica seem immune -- the latter because it is
devoid of people other than researchers and scientists (in itself no
guarantee) and latter because all the attrocities were committed in the
19th century and (dare one say it) there are just about none left to
commit -- though there were some pretty terrible things done against the
aborigines until mid century (stealing their children and rearing them
"white" in the name of God and goodness, etc. Ah, Bob Dylan, true
prophet!)
I think anyone who has some knowledge of this century's history and who
has not spent his/her life with nose completely buried in scores must come
to grips with the inevitable tension of relating the artist to the art.
Coping with that tension IS what living is all about. And it is doubly
tough on those of us idealists who desperately want our artists to be as
noble and wonderful as their art. So few are, and maybe we shouldn't
expect it of them. But inevitably we ask, sotto voce and maybe only to
ourselves, why can't they be...
Maybe living with this tension will lead to some compassion for weakness,
without in any way condoning it; to being able to cope with a criticism of
an admired artist without feeling that "bashing" is taking place; to not
having to live with either/or. A lot to ask. I ask it of myself every day
as I listen to Wagner and Janacek (no domestic paragon he), to R Strauss,
even those recordings made during the Third Reich. And to the conducting
of Furtwangler (no Nazi, to be sure, but he did hobnob with some of the
top ones so it's fair to ask, as the Major might in "Taking Sides", "will
these hands ne'er be clean?") and to HvK (whose opportunistic hands were
definitely not clean, but who, in his younger days, was an extraordinary
conductor, and even to Gieseking and Bohm and others of the whole sick crew
who were great musicians and shallow men. Am I, a refugee and survivor of
the Nazi madness, tainted by such listening? I think of it more as loss of
innocence, an acceptance of imperfection in the world. An unwillingness
to cast the first stone: how much of a hero would I have been faced
with Stalin's purges or the might of the Gestapo? No one was immune;
no one should be judged by those who weren't there to experience it for
themselves. A lot to ask of our older and younger list members, especially
those who like crisp lines of demarcation: this is right, this is wrong;
this is the best, this is crap. All I know is: this is life.
I don't know where this thread is going, having jumped in in the middle.
But I hope it's not heading for a shrill bifurcation of that's my view of
Wagner and you're wrong. If so, watch this space for one list dropout.
Too teedjus!
And Rachel, it's the waiter who is way off the track in jumping to
conclusions about you and your book. You have nothing to feel sorry for
or guilty about; instead, pity the poor slob who made the remark, and
hone your rapid response skills. When all else fails, you can always say,
"F...you, bird brain, it's that kind of logical thinking that will keep you
forever a busboy."
Eric Kisch
(feeling like the opening of the Mahler Ninth)
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