Beethoven variations : poems on a life

"Padel's imagery and imagination took me deeper into Beethoven than many biographies I've read." -- Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times

A fascinating poetic journey into the mind and heart of a musical genius, from the author of the celebrated Darwin: A Life in Poems

Ruth Padel's new sequence of poems, in four movements, is a personal voyage through the life and legend of one of the world's greatest composers. She uncovers the man behind the music, charting his private thoughts and feelings through letters, diaries, sketchbooks, and the conversation books he used as his hearing declined. She gives us Beethoven as a battered four-year-old, weeping at the clavier; the young virtuoso pianist agonized by his encroaching deafness; the passionate, heartbroken lover; the clumsy eccentric making coffee with exactly sixty beans. Padel's quest takes her into the heart of Europe and back to her own musical childhood: Her great-grandfather, who studied in Leipzig with a pupil of Beethoven's, became a concert pianist before migrating to Britain; her parents met making music; and Padel grew up playing the viola, Beethoven's instrument as a child. Her book is a poet and string player's intimate connection across the centuries with an artist who, though increasingly isolated, ended even his most harrowing works on a note of hope.

• Listen p. 1
• Music in the Dart of the Mind
• Birthplace p. 5
• Idealising the Unattainable Can Begin Very Early p. 6
• If Your Father Damaged You p. 7
• His Mother Warms His Feet on a Boat p. 9
• Home Town p. 10
• On Not Needing Other People p. 12
• Growing Up with Beethoven p. 15
• In the Orchestra Pit p. 17
• Meeting Mozart p. 18
• You Rescue Your Father from Jail p. 19
• The Memento p. 20
• The Boy on Dragon Rock p. 22
• Virtuoso
• City of Music p. 25
• What Could Go Wrong? p. 27
• Earthquake p. 28
• To Be Played with the Utmost Delicacy p. 29
• Moonlight Sonata p. 31
• The Jealous Demon p. 32
• Julie p. 33
• He Takes Rooms in a Country Village to Rest His Ears p. 34
• Human Fire p. 35
• Take This Cup from Me p. 36
• A Flute of Lilac Wood p. 38
• Until It Please the Fates to Break the Thread p. 39
• Hero
• Eroica p. 43
• Letters to Josephine p. 44
• The Shadow Behind the Door p. 48
• Wine of the Heart p. 51
• Stained Manuscript p. 54
• On Cushioning Your Ears in a Bombardment p. 55
• Therese p. 56
• Looking Out of a Back Window p. 57
• The Vulnerability of Violins p. 59
• Meeting of the Waters p. 61
• The Pencil p. 62
• Forever Yours, Forever Mine, Forever Us p. 63
• You Must Not Be Human
• Prayer on Burying a Flame p. 67
• Three Days p. 69
• Girl on a Sofa p. 70
• India Dreams p. 71
• To the Distant Beloved p. 72
• The Battle for Karl p. 74
• First Entry in a Conversation Book p. 75
• In the Lydian Mode p. 77
• On Opening the Manuscript of Opus 131 In the Music Archive, Krakow p. 79
• The Rauhenstein Ruins p. 81
• Breaking Axle p. 83
• Musica Humana p. 86
• Life-Notes: A Coda p. 89
• A Selection of His Works p. 123
• Further Reading p. 127
• Acknowledgements p. 128