Chapter Seven
Prof. Gray took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. Then he directed his gaze back to the manuscript lying on the desk in front of him.
Jeremy sat forward on his seat, directly across from the professor. David and Elizabeth were in back of him, seated against the far wall.
Jeremy broke the silence. “As soon as we saw what we had on our hands, we immediately thought of you. David and I—and Elizabeth too—know that you’re the foremost Beethoven expert on the east coast.”
“Mmm,” the professor mumbled. “Tell me once again exactly what I’m looking at.”
Jeremy cleared his throat. “I believe this is a new, previously undiscovered piece by Beethoven. This manuscript is in his copyist’s hand, but Beethoven makes it clear from the remarks he’s written in the margins of the page that it’s his piece.”
The professor Gray looked up for a moment. “This doesn’t look like the hand of any of the Beethoven copyists I know.”
“No, we assume his name is Hofhammer, since that name appears at the bottom of the first page of the manuscript.”
The professor shook his head gently. “Hofhammer…I know of no such person in Beethoven’s life,” he said. “I don’t think you can assume that this person has anything to do with Beethoven. Tell me again, where did you find the manuscript?”
“In London, during a concert tour I was giving a couple of weeks ago. I found it in a little shop that was going out of business.”
“This shop sold musical scores?”
“No, it seems to have been primarily a book shop that specialized in first editions and rare books. It was a little family-run store, not that impressive, but it had been around for a long time. The owner said that the store has been in family for four generations.”
“A book shop? But they sold rare scores?”
“Not really, or at least that wasn’t what they were set up to do. There were only a couple of other scores in the whole store in a pile that looked like it had been dragged up from the basement just for the final going out of business sale. Everything was in a bit of a mess and they weren’t too anxious to answer questions.”
“Not even about this manuscript?”
“To tell you the truth, once I had a clue about what this manuscript might be, I wasn’t in the mood to ask them any questions. They described it only as a nineteenth-century music manuscript. As far as I could see, they had no idea what they really had and I wasn’t interested in having them look too closely at it. They were selling the few scores they had for twenty-five dollars apiece. I wasn’t about to argue with that price and I just wanted to get out of there before they changed their minds.”
“So they made no claim that this was a manuscript by Beethoven, or by one of Beethoven’s copyists?”
“No. They made no claims whatsoever. I just bought it quickly and got out of the store as fast as I could.”
Professor Gray looked back to the manuscript. “A document like this found in an old book store in London. That would be unusual to say the least. Was it an old building?”
“Very. Mid-nineteenth century at least.”
“Still, the fact that you found it in a book shop worries me.”
“On the contrary, Professor,” Jeremy replied enthusiastically. “It was because it was a book store that they didn’t know what they had, and so they didn’t display it. I may have been the first person to even look at it for decades.”
“Well, I suppose that’s possible.”
“Once I got back to my hotel room in London, I immediately looked up some samples of Beethoven’s handwriting online. There are quite a few available—good quality images. I found that my hunch was right. Even though it only had Hofhammer’s name on it, I’d seen enough facsimiles of Beethoven’s letters that I was pretty sure that those comments in the margins were in Beethoven’s handwriting. Sure enough, the more I compared my score to the facsimiles, the more I was convinced that those comments are actually by Beethoven himself.”
Professor Gray peered intently at the manuscript once again. Then he sat back in his chair. It’s possible,” he said slowly, “that the comments are in Beethoven’s hand. Either that, or a very good forgery. And the paper itself seems to date from the right period, although that will have to be proven by scientific tests. If it is a document from the first quarter of the nineteenth century, it is hard for me to imagine that anyone would bother to take the trouble to duplicate Beethoven’s hand for such a manuscript. So, yes, it’s possible that the comments in the margins and at the top of some of the pages are in fact in Beethoven’s hand. ”
“I knew it!” said Jeremy eagerly.
“That’s great!” said David, turning eagerly to face Elizabeth, who smiled and nodded back.
“But you tell me,” continued the professor, “that the most important entries are on the first two pages of the manuscript. And I don’t have the first or second page here.”
“As I mentioned before, Professor,” said Jeremy, “I was unable to bring those with me today.”
“Because the comments that I see sprinkled throughout the pages seem a bit odd, at least in terms of the directions a composer might give a copyist. Here, on page twelve of the first movement, Beethoven calls a series of eighth notes ‘stumpfsinnig’—‘stupid.’ Why would a composer say that to a copyist?”
“Yes, yes,” said Jeremy eagerly. “Beethoven seems quitted miffed with this poor Hofhammer fellow. But we know that Beethoven was often quite hard on his copyists! On the first page, Beethoven calls Hofhammer a “Dummkopf” for failing to copy Beethoven’s notes correctly. On the second page, he accuses Hofhammer of ‘sabotaging’ his piece.”
“Yes, but I don’t have the first or second page in front of me. If only you had made a photocopy.”
Jeremy looked down at the floor, shaking his head sadly. “It was monumentally stupid of me not to make photocopies. But at first I didn’t want to take the chance of harming the manuscript and in the end I just forgot about it.”
“Humph,” grunted the professor. “It is regrettable. But there are other issues to take into consideration before I can completely vouch for this as a newly discovered work by Beethoven. There are stylistic concerns of course.”
Jeremy’s expression became serious. “Of course, Professor. This does seem to be an exceptional work by Beethoven.”
“If it is a piece by Beethoven,” replied the professor drolly.
“But why would it not be?” protested Jeremy.
“Look, if this symphony was in fact composed after the eighth symphony, then it would have to have been composed after 1812 but before…let’s say 1821. But I’ve looked at your score. There are strange passages in it that I’m not even sure how to describe. The dissonances—completely unresolved in some cases—that are sprinkled throughout this score are hard to understand. It’s just very erratic. Not just for Beethoven, but for any known composer working in this time period. Some of these melodic phrases…the only way to describe them is angular, sometimes jagged. The rhythms are sometimes extremely repetitive and at other times the syncopation is almost violent.”
“But wasn’t Beethoven deaf by that point?” protested Jeremy. “Wasn’t he completely deaf?”
“He certainly had great difficulty hearing conversations,” said Professor Gray, nodding his head gently. “Sometimes he had buzzing sounds in his ears, sometimes he didn’t. But I don’t think that you could attribute something like this…”
Jeremy’s expression had become anguished. “But wouldn’t that drive anybody back into the seclusion of their own mind…their own thoughts?” he pleaded. “Wouldn’t that cause anyone to stop worrying about whether people liked your music or not? Wouldn’t you just want to somehow musically express the demons that were assailing you?”
The professor smiled faintly. “It’s true that we don’t have any detailed knowledge about how Beethoven felt about his increasing deafness. We know it made him feel isolated. He made that v
ery clear. But he was always somewhat isolated. He isolated himself…by his attitude, his anger at people who he thought might be trying to thwart him.”
“Exactly!” said Jeremy eagerly.
“But there’s really no indication that these things would drive Beethoven to completely abandon his traditional style and embark on a completely new style.”
“But there is!” Jeremy demanded. “Everyone agrees that Beethoven’s late style is adventurous. He breaks new ground. He challenges convention. He invents new forms. How about the ninth symphony, especially the scherzo movement and finale? No one before Beethoven ever wrote music like that. And the last string quartets, The ‘Hammerklavier’ sonata? The ‘Grosse Fuga’ for God’s sake!”
“Yes,” said the professor. “Those are exceptional works, remarkable works. Some people have also labeled some of them as erratic. But the score you have given to me is different. It’s not like those. And don’t forget, some of his most challenging late works, come much later than the period we’re talking about.”
“Well, I think it’s clear that Beethoven is striking out on a whole new path here,” said Jeremy calmly. “He’s coming to terms with his deafness and he’s exploring new worlds. He doesn’t care what people think of him.”
“Look,” said the professor, tapping his fingers rapidly on the desk. “This just doesn’t make any sense. There is absolutely no evidence to suggest that Beethoven experimented with the sort of strange and erratic style that we see here between 1812 and 1821. Look at all the other works he composed in the same period. They show no evidence of a desire to experiment with this strange new style.”
The professor paused. “I’m sorry to be telling you all these things,” he continued. “I know it’s not what you wanted to hear.”
Jeremy leaned forward eagerly. “But the fact is, professor, that you agree with me that the handwriting of the comments in the margins does appear to be Beethoven’s.”
“It could well be.”
“So this work could be by Beethoven.”
“I would be surprised if it were.”
“Well, professor, I think you’re going to be in for a big surprise.”
“So what did you think about all that?” David said as the three walked down the hall away from the professor’s office.
“A little disappointing, I suppose,” said Elizabeth quietly.
“Actually, I'm not that disappointed,” Jeremy said cheerfully. “And I'm not at all surprised. Professor Gray may be a famous Beethoven scholar, but he's clearly not a visionary.”
“Not a visionary?” asked David. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“It’s simple,” Jeremy replied. “ I know that this work is different stylistically from most of Beethoven's other known works written after the eighth symphony, but that doesn't at all mean that this is not one of his symphonies. Clearly Beethoven was feeling his way at this point. He had come to accept his deafness, but he was still eager to explore new ways to communicate his inner feelings. Is this symphony different from the other works written about the same time? Of course it is. But who had a more independent spirit than Beethoven? He was proving to himself that he wasn't finished. That he could still explore new worlds. Maybe this was a failed experiment and after this one work he decided to abandon his new direction. But that doesn’t mean it’s not by Beethoven."
"Well, I certainly admire your attitude, Jeremy, "said Elizabeth. “You’re obviously as undaunted as ever.”
“Of course I am. Why shouldn't I be? Besides, the really important meeting comes tomorrow with Mr. Morgenstern. He's the antiquarian I told David about. He and I have an appointment with him tomorrow morning at 10:00. Professor Gray may have his opinions about the manuscript, but Morgenstern's opinions are a lot more important. If he gives the manuscript his stamp of approval—if he gives his personal opinion that the work is really by Beethoven, then the sky is the limit. The largest auction houses will fall over one another to offer up this manuscript to the highest bidder. And the winning bid will be for millions.”
"And what does Melissa think of all this?” David asked. “Is she as excited as you are?”
“Frankly, she could care less. She’s never even looked at the manuscript,” Jeremy said.
“I guess it’s just not really her kind of music,” Elizabeth said.
“Right!” Jeremy said eagerly. “Everybody has their own individual tastes in music. And I think it’s great that Melissa is passionate about the kind of music she plays…or at least used to.”
“Of course,” said David, patting him gently on the back. “Well, I really hope this whole manuscript thing works out for you.”
Jeremy smiled and looked from Elizabeth to David. "I want you both to know that I really appreciate your support. And David, tomorrow you and I will take the next big step. Morgenstern's office is only about five blocks from your apartment, so I'll meet you at your place at about 9:30 and we'll walk over there together.”
“We'll all keep our fingers crossed,” David said.