A primary issue in both stage and screen versions is Mozart’s behavior: his cavorting with Constanze in a public room of a noble residence, his use of inappropriate language, his excessive drinking, his lack of respect for the emperor and archbishop, his public parody of Salieri, his high self-opinion, and his general insensitivity to propriety. That which took place in view of the Salzburg archbishop and the emperor would have resulted in banishment from court or worse. Even though protocol had been loosened during the reign of the “people’s” emperor, it is almost unimaginable that anyone would tell Joseph II that something he said was “absurd.” Again, the result would have meant that none of the Viennese operas would have been commissioned or composed and that no venue for them would have existed. Certainly, Mozart must have treated the emperor and his entourage with some special care.
Mozart’s drinking runs as a sub-theme throughout the plot in Amadeus. But in reality, it seems that he rarely drank to excess, though in his last year or two his drinking did appear to have increased. During the summer of 1791 when Constanze was in Baden, “he used to drink champagne with Schikaneder all morning, and punch all night.” But this report stems from Ignaz Ernst Ferdinand Karl Arnold, who was without firsthand knowledge. While alcoholic writers are legion, the condition seems rare among composers; it is possible that great music was composed under the influence, but not with such consistency or productivity.
Amadeus also brings up the issue of Mozart’s extramarital conduct. The scene is after the first performance of The Abduction from the Seraglio. Constanze Weber is introduced to the emperor as Mozart’s fiancee. Thereupon Cavalierri, the prima donna and in fact Salieri’s mistress, slugs Mozart. Salieri replies under his breath, “Mozart’s had her.” About Mozart’s sexual encounters, apart from Constanze, one can only speculate. Some biographers have it that Mozart was in love with almost all of his keyboard students, his prima donnas, and his cousin “the B?sle,” to whom he wrote a series of scatological letters. Whether Mozart was infatuated, in love, or had sexual liaisons with all or none of these women cannot be proven one way or the other. If he did, Mozart’s catalog might have rivaled that of Don Giovanni’s. But one must note two letters that suggest prudence and restraint. The first one concerns the Bohemian composer Joseph Mysliwecek’s syphilis; his nose had become ulcerated and was nearly gone. Mozart experienced his appearance at firsthand and was well aware of the cause of this disfigurement, for he wrote to his father: “There are people who think that no one can love a poor girl without having evil designs; and that charming word maitresse, wh–e in our tongue, is really much too charming! But I am no Brunetti! no Mysliwechek! I am a Mozart, and a young and clean-minded Mozart.”
In December 1781 he again wrote: “You must, therefore, allow me to disclose to you my reasons, which, moreover, are very well founded. The voice of nature speaks as loud in me as in others, louder, perhaps, than in many a big strong lout of a fellow. I simply cannot live as most young men do in these days. In the first place, I have too much religion; in the second place, I have too great a love of my neighbour and too high a feeling of honour to seduce an innocent girl; and, in the third place, I have too much horror and disgust, too much dread and fear of diseases and too much care for my health to fool about with whores.”
It is certainly possible that Mozart was again posturing for his father, as he did with some frequency during and after his tour to Paris and back in 1777-78. Still, the Mysliwecek encounter must have made a lasting impression about the dangers of loose living, especially for one so conscious of his own appearance.
Unappreciated and misunderstood
Some postmortems lead us to believe that Mozart’s early death was precipitated, if not caused, by the way he lived during his last years, a conclusion that could also be drawn from the last portions of Amadeus. Others favored the poisoning theory. Attempts to diagnose Mozart’s last illness from both medical and lay observation have put forth a variety of non-poisonous causes ranging from typhus to rheumatic fever. The most thorough investigation, by Dr. Peter J. Davies, concludes that Mozart died of Schonlein-Henoch syndrome caused by a streptococcal infection contracted at a Masonic lodge meeting on November 18. Attempted diagnoses after two hundred years remain unconvincing. Nevertheless, the specific cause of death would not have had so much ink spilled over it if it were not for the rumors of poisoning.
More fascinating than Mozart’s terminal illness is Davies’ conclusion about what drove the composer during his adult years. Why and how did he produce so much during some periods and so little during others? Dr. Davies believes that Mozart suffered from a cyclothymic disorder with upswings and downturns in mood, but without psychotic tendencies. He points out that “artists are capable of astonishing bursts of creative activity . . . and Mozart is the ultimate example.” Beginning with the late 1770s, Davies detects five such bursts: (1) Mannheim, 1777-78; (2) Munich, 1780-81; (3) Vienna, first half of 1786; (4) Vienna, summer 1788; and (5) Vienna, first quarter of 1791. For example, during Davies’ third burst, Mozart finished The Marriage of Figaro, The Impresario, the two piano concertos K. 488 and 491, the piano quartet K. 493, the horn concerto K. 495, and some smaller works. On the other hand, periods of overt productivity (that is, the completion of a work) should not be allowed to obscure times of covert preparation. With the excitement of a premiere like Figaro, Mozart’s behavior, according to Davies, might go somewhat off the rails. Davies also finds a narcissistic dependency, requiring “a regular supply of love from an esteemed love object.” With this combination of psychological factors and the general problems of security encountered by a free-lance musician, it is no wonder that Mozart may have had at times some difficulty coping.
Amadeus portrays Mozart in the nineteenth-century fashion as an unappreciated and misunderstood genius whose financial situation was either borderline or impoverished, with only a few coins left. Yet, according to Shaffer’s and Forman’s film version, he lived throughout the period after 1781 in a luxurious apartment in central Vienna. In fact, Mozart changed residence frequently, and his income, according to recent studies, was unusually high for a musician, placing him during some years in the top 10 percent of all Vienna’s inhabitants. Either way, Mozart was never poor by the standards of his time. The idea of an impoverished composer comes from a series of letters he wrote to his Masonic brother Michael Puchberg from 1788 to 1791 asking for loans. For example, on July 12, 1789, he writes:
DEAREST, MOST BELOVED FRIEND AND MOST HONOURABLE B.O.
Great God! I would not wish my worst enemy to be in my present position. And if you, most beloved friend and brother, forsake me, we are altogether lost, both my unfortunate and blameless self and my poor sick wife and child. Only the other day when I was with you I was longing to open my heart to you, but I had not the courage to do so — and indeed I should still not have the courage — for, as it is, I only dare to write and I tremble as I do so — and I should not even dare to write, were I not certain that you know me, that you are aware of my circumstances, and that you are wholly convinced of my innocence as my unfortunate and most distressing situation is concerned. Good God! I am coming to you not with thanks but with fresh entreaties! Instead of paying my debts I am asking for more money!
From these letters and the lack of other data, it has been concluded that Mozart was rejected by the Viennese.
Rather than a single reason, a number of factors contributed to his worsening financial situation. Mozart’s income came from five sources: public and private appearances as a pianist, the giving of subscription concerts, teaching, commissions, and the publication of his music. Such endeavors were heavily affected, as they are today, by economic conditions and related factors. In the late 1780s Austria was occupied with the Turkish war, and many of Mozart’s patrons were serving in the military or were not at their Viennese residences; even the emperor was in the field during 1788. Constanze had been ill, requiring her to go to Baden for a cure; at one point her condition with an ulcerated ankle was potentially serious. Cures at the spring baths, used only by the wealthy, must have been expensive. During the late 1780s Mozart appears to have been trying to streamline his income-producing activities from several sources to composition alone. Despite the general as well as their particular economic situation, the Mozarts continued to live in their accustomed style, resulting in temporary problems of cash flow. The situation was exacerbated by their failure to save any money during his high-flying first six or seven years of the 1780s and by a judgment against Mozart in 1791 resulting from a suit brought by Prince Karl Lichnowsky that required a substantial payment. Nevertheless, had Mozart lived, he would probably have equaled or exceeded Haydn’s considerable earnings during the 1790s.
During the early 1780s, the disparity of high-income estimates with expenses led the Mozart scholar Uwe Kramer to ask what happened to Mozart’s money. Kramer concluded that much of this cash was gambled away at billiards and cards. This theory has met with mixed reactions ranging from rejection to the acceptance of it as at least a possibility. Though it can neither be proven nor disproven, some statements about Mozart’s style of living could be read as disguised references to gambling. Peter J. Davies believes that Mozart’s personality traits, combined with his environment, could have made him prone to such compulsive behavior.
The Amadeus version of Mozart’s last days and interment are a combination of imagination and discredited tradition. Imagination dominates the Shaffer and Forman film version of Mozart’s last days, where Salieri’s attendance at a performance of The Magic Flute on October 13, 1791, is placed in time close to Mozart’s death on December 5. Shaffer’s version has Salieri assisting Mozart with the Requiem during a brief final illness. In actuality, Mozart’s widow pursued at least three composers to complete Mozart’s last work before settling on Franz Xaver S?ssmayr as the collaborator, and the final illness lasted for three weeks, not a matter of hours. It was Constanze and her family who lovingly cared for him, an irony that would never have been appreciated by his father and sister. Mozart’s funeral and burial were arranged by the Baron Gottfried van Swieten, who adhered to the Josephian burial guidelines and was cognizant of the deceased’s financial situation. Amadeus presents a probably accurate picture of the burial. To today’s eyes, the dumping of a bagged body into a communal grave must seem the ultimate insult, but it must be stressed that in 1791 this was the burial experienced by about 85 percent of Vienna’s population. It was the norm, not an interment reserved only for the impoverished.
Wrongheaded interpretations
Amadeus is but one of several recent attempts to exploit the continued fascination with Mozart during the last two hundred and thirty years. Two recent widely read books also freely interpret Mozart’s biography and psyche: Wolfgang Hildesheimer’s Mozart and Francis Carr’s Mozart and Constanze. Hildesheimer provides many insights with his close readings of the letters, but his speculations about Mozart’s love life and his emotional detachment from the world around him have little support. He views the man’s expression as artificial and insensitive, erroneously measuring Mozart against today’s expected modes of reaction to given situations. Unfamiliar with recent research, he supports some of the old fictions and adds some of his own. Like Amadeus, his Mozart is a fascinating character, and the work contains penetrating insights together with many wrongheaded interpretations.
Another dilettante biographer, Francis Carr, also gives the impression of a search for historical truth by using documents and by thanking the learned men of the Mozarteum in Salzburg for their assistance. Carr revives the poisoning hypothesis, accusing not Salieri, but Franz Hofdemel because of an affair (manufactured by Carr) that Mozart had with Hofdemel’s wife Magdalena, one of his piano students. Hofdemel, days after Mozart’s death, disfigured his wife and then committed suicide. While the sorry fate of the Hofdemels is true, the only additional connection to be made with Mozart is that he was a Masonic brother and creditor of the composer. Otherwise, only the coincidence of time and place can be made between Mozart’s death and Hofdemel’s suicide. Carr’s book is nothing but tabloid biography masquerading under documentation.
Amadeus the play and movie, as well as the books by Hildesheimer and Carr, derived their success from the unquestionable fascination Mozart holds for us today. Without the name of Mozart, the deep interest in these artifacts of our own culture would not exist. For those who want letters, memoirs, and other primary sources in order to make their own interpretation, these are readily available, but they cannot be taken as “just the facts,” for nearly every writer of letters and memoirs, as well as the purveyors of rumors, had his own agendas and beliefs. It is from the documents themselves and their interpretation that the Mozartean mythologies flourished.
The makers of Amadeus did get one thing right: After all is said and done, no one really can explain how Mozart created his music.
? 1984 The Saul Zaentz Co.
Why does Mozart command so much attention? Perhaps it stems from the eternally misguided effort to understand the man behind the music. Although Mozart’s music is often recognized as universal, it has received varying interpretations of its essential meaning. For example, critical opinion of the Symphony No. 40 in G Minor K. 550 is one of total admiration, but its character has remained elusive. Robert Schumann found it classical in the strict sense, full of Grecian “lightness and grace.” Alfred Einstein thought it a “fatalistic piece of chamber music.” Jens Peter Larsen believed it was not the expression of a private mood. Robbins Landon stated that it belongs to a series of works revealing the downside of Mozart’s manic tendencies, while Jack Westrup found in it the spirit of opera buffa. Probably no work of the symphonic canon elicits such a wide range of affective reactions from knowledgeable critics. But perhaps it is this variety of reactions to his music that explains the varied interpretations of the person. Perhaps it is only in this sense that the biographies with their explanations of the man parallel the receptions of the music. While one can attempt to set the historical record straight, Shaffer’s and Forman’s Salieri had it right on one count: the phenomenon of Mozart transcends explanation.
“life of mozart” by john rosselli
“amadeus mozart” by Ibi Lepscky