He tells them that for several years now he’s been losing his hearing and can’t bear the thought of people finding out. He considers the humiliation, the wounds to his pride:
Oh, how could I possibly admit an infirmity in the one sense which ought to be more perfect in me than others, a sense which I once possessed in the highest perfection, a perfection such as few in my profession enjoy or ever have enjoyed.This is a common response to personal struggles - self-imposed isolation, to spare oneself from pity or insensitive reactions. He expresses its agonies, the fear of exposure warring with the desire to be understood.
What’s most powerful in his letter is the tension between craving life and desiring an end to his suffering. He admits that he considered suicide. What mostly held him back was an urge to keep working on his music. Though virtue, too, might have played a part in holding suicidal thoughts at bay, he emphasizes the role of art even more: “Oh, it seemed to me impossible to leave the world until I had forth all that I felt was within me.”
Continuing to live to see out one’s potential, and what one can keep bringing to the world, even in the face of suffering and uncertainty, means everything. It isn’t something that can be encouraged through platitudes or rote admonishments. It’s bloody and raw and hard-won (and can be easily lost too). It’s everything.
Beethoven lived another twenty-five years after writing this letter. Here’s his last symphony, courtesy of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on their YouTube channel:
I read this letter as part of the Deal Me In 2017 challenge.
