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OJ 5/6, [3] : 7-5-09

Note by Schenker re: Cotta, dated July 5, 1909

{sheet 1}
Tgb. 5. 7. 09 für das Cotta-Album. 101.1

Welch unüberbrückbarer, ewiger Gegensatz zwischen Geben u. Nehmen, zwischen Gebender u. Nehmender!

Alles Geben sammelt, konzentriert, – Alles Nehmen zerstreut, zersplittert!

Beim Gebender zwar die Qual des Ringens, dafür aber die beglückende Lust, insgeheim den Gesetzten einer Idee zu folgen, Geist u. Seele in das Geleise derselben gebannt zu wissen. Dem Nehmenden hingegen sind zwar alle Zeugungsqualen erspart, desto schmerzlicher leidet entbehrt er eben unter den Mangel jeglichen festgelegten Geleises, [illeg. interlinear words, also canceled] Nie weiß er recht, was er wählen, wie [ corr ], wenn er, wo er nehmen soll; es ist ein banges u. unruhvolles Taumeln von Lust zu Unlust, von Erfüllung zu Täuschung, ohne daß es diesem quälenden Zustand auf den Grund zu kommen verstunde!

[ asterisks ]

Namentlich in der Kunst steht einer Minderzahl Gebender eine übergroße Mehrzahl Nehmender gegenüber.

Während jene das Centrum stets in sich haben, u. selbst noch im Irrtum unverrückbar {sheet 2} einen bestimmten – eben den durch das Ziel bestimmten – Weg gehen, bleibt den Letzteren, in Ermanglung eines solchen Centrums in sich, nichts übrig, als gleichsam centrifugal zu werden u. mit tausende[n] verlegenen Fragen die Außenwelt zu bestürmen: bald die Kunst überhaupt, bald das Kunstwerk u. den Künstler. Nu[ r ] finden sie Antwort den eigenen Fragen u. wieder sind es nur den Gebenden, den auch jenen zu beantworten fähig sind. Doch was nützt leider alles Antworten ? – Die Nehmender stehen[corr] ja selbst auch diesen Antworten wieder nur mit noch verlegeneren Fragen gegenüber !

Es gehet eben ein ewige Kluft zwischen Gebender u. Nehmender.
_________________

Wien, an S....r 1909
[ sign’d: ] Heinrich Sch

© Heirs of Heinrich Schenker.
© Transcription Ian D. Bent 2005.

Note by Schenker re: Cotta, dated July 5, 1909

{sheet 2}
Diary July 5, 1909 for the Cotta album. 101.1

What an irreconcilable, everlasting contrast between giving and taking, between giver and taker!

All giving draws together, concentrates, – all taking disperses, splits asunder!

On the part of the giver [there is] admittedly the agony of struggling, but in return the happy desire secretly to follow the laws of an idea, to experience heart and mind spellbound on the track of that [idea]. The taker, conversely, while admittedly spared all the agonies of creation, suffers is bereft all the more painfully through the loss of any fixed track [illeg. interlinear words, also canceled]. He never rightly knows what he should choose, how, if, [or] where he should take. It is an uneasy and restless teetering between desire and undesire, between fulfillment and delusion, without any deep understanding of this agonizing state of mind!

[ asterisks ]

Particularly in art, there is a minority of givers, in contrast to a vast majority of takers.

Whilst the former always have the center within themselves and even when in error unwaveringly pursue {sheet 2} a specified path—even a path specified by the goal—, for the latter, for want of such a center within themselves, nothing remains but as it were to become centrifugal and to pester the outer world with thousands of confused questions: sometimes [about] art in general, sometimes the work of art and the artist. They find the answer only to individual questions, and again it is only the givers who are capable of answering those. So, sadly, what use are all these answers? – The takers merely meet even these answers with yet further confused questions!

Between givers and takers there exists an everlasting chasm.
_________________

Vienna, in ...[?], 1909
[ sign’d: ] Heinrich Sch[enker]

© Translation Ian D. Bent 2005.

COMMENTARY:
Format: handwritten note, dated and signed, two small oblong sheets in vertical format, placed one above the other and written continuously, recto only.

FOOTNOTES:

1 p.101 of the diary, OJ 1/5, is missing; p.99 is similarly made up of two small sheets, one above the other, p.100 is a half-size sheet, then there are two sheets numbered “p.100” in ink with “a” and “b” added respectively in pencil, followed by p.102. In view of this annotation, it appears likely that OJ 5/6, [3] at one time formed part of the diary, but was transferred by Schenker to this file of draft letters to Cotta.

SUMMARY:
Polemic on giving and taking in art.

© Commentary, Footnotes, Summary Ian D. Bent 2005.

Bent, Ian
Schenker, Heinrich
Polemic on giving and taking in art.
DE
Cambridge University Faculty of Music-Ian Bent
IPR: Heirs of Heinrich Schenker; Transcription, Translation, Commentary, Footnotes, and Summary: Ian D. Bent 2005.
Schenker, Heinrich; Cotta, J. G.; art; givers; giving; takers; taking; idea; creation
Handwritten note by Schenker, dated July 5, 1909
note
academic; musicology; music theory
OJ 5/6, [3]
1909-07-05
2005-08-10
Schenker note
All reasonable steps have been taken to locate the heirs of Heinrich Schenker. Any claim to intellectual rights on this document should be addressed to the Schenker Correspondence Project, Faculty of Music, University of Cambridge, at schenkercorrespondence@mus.cam.ac.uk.
holograph note
Schenker, Heinrich (1909-1935)--Schenker, Jeanette (1935-c.1942)--Ratz, Erwin (c.1942-c.1955)--Jonas, Oswald (c.1955-1978)--University of California, Riverside (1978--)
IPR: Heirs of Heinrich Schenker; Image: Special Collections Library, University of California, Riverside; Transcription, Translation, Commentary, Footnotes, and Summary: Ian D. Bent.
Vienna
1909

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