Xavier Jon Puslowski - Franz Liszt, His Circle, and His Elusive Oratorio

Franz Liszt, His Circle, and His
Elusive Oratorio

Liszt in a Polish fur coat (1840), Josef Kiehuber lithograph

Xavier Jon Puslowski

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD

Lanham Boulder New York London

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Puslowski, Xavier Jon, author.

Franz Liszt, his circle, and his elusive oratorio / Xavier Jon Puslowski.

pages cm

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-4422-3802-2 (hardcover : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-4422-3803-9 (ebook) 1. Liszt, Franz, 1811-1886. 2. Liszt, Franz, 1811-1886--Friends and associates. 3. Liszt, Franz, 1811-1886. Legende vom Heiligen Stanislaus. 4. Composers--Hungary--Biography. 5. Music--Poland--19th century--History and criticism. I. Title.

ML410.L7P87 2014

780.92--dc23

[B]

2014013317

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

Nineteenth-century Poland did not exist as a geographical entity. A major European power until the latter half of the seventeenth century, the country had weakened from exhaustive internal strife and external warfare. By the 1760s, it was finally too debilitated to prevent rapacious neighbors from invading its frontiers.

An assemblage of Polish nobles rallied to fight off the invasion, but after four years of struggle (17681772), they were defeated by the armies of czarist Russia. The rulers of Prussia and Austria joined with Russia to occupy large portions of Polish territory, forcing the Polish Sejm (parliament), which was surrounded by the Russian army, to sanction what came to be called the First Partition of Poland. With its neighbors holding almost a third of its lands, the Polish nobility determined to reform their government and fight off further encroachment. But its armed forces were no match for the Russian juggernaut led by Catherine II and backed by Prussia. The victorious neighbors then (1793) proceeded to take another third of Polands territory. Once again, the Poles fought back, this time under the leadership of Thaddeus Kosciuszko, erstwhile hero of the American Revolution. And, once again, they were beaten (1794). This defeat enabled the occupying powers to secure the last third of the country, effectively wiping it from the map of Europe (October 1795).

The nation remained part of the three countries that had conquered itwith all the subservience that implied. The area around Poznan was Prussian, Galicia and Krakw Austrian, and the major part of Old Poland, including Warsaw, was a Russian domain.

The ramifications of the eighteenth-century partitions of Poland created a diplomatic issue throughout the nineteenth century for the rest of Europe, the so-called Polish question, temporarily resolved after the First World War with the establishment of an independent Poland. Ignace Paderewski, popularly thought to be the pianistic successor to Franz Liszt, was intensely involved in this effort. Therein lies a most obvious connection between musical and political developments.

From the nineteenth to the early twentieth century, as governments dealt with the Polish question and the consequences of revolution in various parts of Poland, the plight of Poland and the Poles filled an expiatory role not only for Western cultural elites but also for popular perceptions. Poles came to embody the romantic ideal of tragedy because, in spite of heroic individual exploits, they faced insurmountable odds in trying to achieve a national state while deemed to have been singled out for perpetual subjugation by their autocratic neighbors.

To be Polish acquired a distinctive quality evoking melancholic sadness, steadfast honor, and quixotic bravery. Amy Fay, a young American born in 1844, in a plantation on the banks of the Mississippi, naively expressed these feelings when she wrote to her family from Germany, where she had been studying music with Franz Liszt. Upon meeting a Polish artist, she had this emotional reaction:

He is a Pole, and is very proud of his nationality. And, indeed, there is something interesting and romantic about being a Pole. The very name conjures up thoughts of revolutions, conspiracies, bloody executions, masked balls, and, of course, grace, wit and beauty!... I dont know what sort of a mind he has, but I find myself looking at him and saying to myself with a certain degree of satisfaction, He is a Pole. Why I should have this feeling I know not, but I seem to be proud of knowing Poles!

Whenever a Pole was introduced by the ritual phrase il est polonais, the implications of the tragic Polish experience were supposed to be comprised and understood in the collective imagination. At a time when French was the universal language, the phrase reverberated with implication.

The myriad meanings attributed to Poland and the Poles also symbolized matters of general European concern, such as the advancement of popular democracy and the solidarity of oppressed minorities. Poetic admiration for the Polish cause could be found anywhere, from the youthful verses of Alfred Tennyson (England) and Franois-Xavier Garneau (Canada) to the mature enthusiasms of August Platen-Hallermnde (Germany) and Gabriele Rossetti (Italy). But because Paris was the epicenter of cultural and intellectual life for nineteenth-century Europe, Paris (and, by extension, France) must be the focus of any inquiry concerning Polish nationalism as a stimulus for romantic works.

Among the composers who used Polish themes, Franz Liszt is an ideal subject, exemplifying the centrality of Poland as a source of inspiration while bowing to the demands of artistic and political French perspectives.

Throughout his life, Liszt came in contact with proponents of Polish purpose. Admittedly, there were other determinants, particularly those emanating from his religious affiliation, but nonetheless, in the end, Liszt became a prisoner of his objective to produce a work that would glorify Poland.

Liszts connections with Poland, and the Polish influences that enveloped him as he pursued his elusive goal, have had small airing. What follows is an attempt to unravel the details of these linkages between Liszt, his circle of friends, and their setting. The nature of the subject matter, including its musical subtext, romanticism and song, lends itself most appropriately to a mosaic pattern of intersecting biographies, alternating with historical sketches, rather than a strictly linear narrative.

The reader will note that non-Polish sources have been used whenever possible in order to preserve the outsiders perspective held by Liszt. The references at the end of each chapter often expand the narrative, and in some instances, repetition has been risked for the sake of clarity.