Norman Schwartz replies to me (no relation):

>>He may know something about Mozart, but he appears (or at least in the
>>movie) to know very little about 18th-century mores.  Much is made of the
>>Mozart character's "crudeness." Simply put, Mozart learned his
>manners from
>>the aristocracy, rather than from the middle-class prudes and parvenus.
>
>Peter Shaffer has an acute awareness of Wolfie's familial background,
>personality and character that Steve Schwartz might have overlooked or
>rather unlikely is unaware of.

I've read the letters.  I know (and indeed have sung) many of the
scatological songs and ensembles.  The point I made is not that Shaffer
is inaccurate in his portrayal of Mozart's "crudeness," but that he doesn't
seem to know the cultural context of it.  Perhaps the only character in
the play who may have been offended by Mozart would have been Baron van
Swieten, as I recall, an Evangelical noble.  But in Catholic 18th-century
Vienna, I doubt any of the rest of the folks Shaffer has Mozart apologizing
to would have likely noticed that Mozart was "crude," because they would
have been *as* crude.  The taboo against "dirty words" and fart jokes took
a while to permeate the general culture, as Evangelicalism spread.  Queen
Victoria may not have been amused, but her predecessor would have.  Queen
Elizabeth I, of course, *made* fart jokes.

Steve Schwartz