Inspiration
The quartet takes its name from the lied "Der Tod und das Mädchen" ("Death and the Maiden, D.531), which Schubert wrote in 1817. The theme of the song - a setting of a poem by that name by Matthias Claudius. - is the theme of the second movement of the quartet. The theme is a death knell that accompanies the song about the terror and comfort of death:
Death and the Maiden
Peter Schöne (baritone) and Boris Cepeda (piano)
The Maiden:
- Oh! leave me! Prithee, leave me! thou grisly man of bone!
- For life is sweet, is pleasant.
- Go! leave me now alone!
- Go! leave me now alone!
Death:
- Give me thy hand, oh! maiden fair to see,
- For I'm a friend, hath ne'er distress'd thee.
- Take courage now, and very soon
- Within mine arms shalt softly rest thee!"
But it is not only this theme of the quartet that recalls death. The quote from the song "makes explicit the overriding theme of the work, its bleak vision and almost unremitting foreboding," writes Andrew Clements. From the violent opening unison. the first movement runs a relentless race through terror, pain and resignation, ending with a dying D minor chord. "The struggle with Death is the subject of the first movement, and the andante accordingly dwells on Death's words," writes Cobbett. After a scherzo movement, with a trio that provides the only lyrical respite from the depressing mood of the piece, the quartet ends with a tarantella — the traditional dance to ward off madness and death. "The finale is most definitely in the character of a dance of death; ghastly visions whirl past in the inexorable uniform rhythm of the tarantella," writes Cobbett.
So strong is the association of death with the quartet that some analysts consider it to be programmatic, rather than absolute music. "The first movement of Schubert's Death and the Maiden String Quartet can be interpreted in a quasi-programmatic fashion, even though it is usually viewed as an abstract work," writes Deborah Kessler. Theologian Frank Ruppert sees the quartet as a musical expression of Judaeo-Christian religious myths. "This quartet, like so many of Schubert's works, is a kind of para-liturgy," he writes. Each movement is about a different episode in the mythic process of death and resurrection.
Read more about this topic: String Quartet No. 14 (Schubert)
Famous quotes containing the word inspiration:
“Poets should be lawgivers; that is, the boldest lyric inspiration should not chide and insult, but should announce and lead, the civil code, and the day’s work. But now the two things seem irreconcilably parted.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Free labor has the inspiration of hope; pure slavery has no hope.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“Although this garrulity of advising is born with us, I confess that life is rather a subject of wonder, than of didactics. So much fate, so much irresistible dictation from temperament and unknown inspiration enter into it, that we doubt we can say anything out of our own experience whereby to help each other.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)