Aaron reviewed Mozart by Maynard Solomon
Mozart: A Life
5 stars
This book has been sitting on my shelf for a long time, and I am glad that I finally was able to pick it up. It is difficult to imagine a more comprehensive study than Solomon's. He details Mozart's life (aided by what was for me a surprisingly robust collection of letters), Mozart's relationships with his parents, and the seemingly endless struggle of attempting to secure a post and the financial security that would come with it. The focus on money and security serves to underscore how perilous life could be. Solomon also writes about the larger context of Salzburg, Vienna, and the other cities that helped shape his life. Solomon is open about where he disagrees with other scholars and where he is pushing his evidence to the point of speculation. I am by no means a subject matter expert here, but as a lay reader I found his …
This book has been sitting on my shelf for a long time, and I am glad that I finally was able to pick it up. It is difficult to imagine a more comprehensive study than Solomon's. He details Mozart's life (aided by what was for me a surprisingly robust collection of letters), Mozart's relationships with his parents, and the seemingly endless struggle of attempting to secure a post and the financial security that would come with it. The focus on money and security serves to underscore how perilous life could be. Solomon also writes about the larger context of Salzburg, Vienna, and the other cities that helped shape his life. Solomon is open about where he disagrees with other scholars and where he is pushing his evidence to the point of speculation. I am by no means a subject matter expert here, but as a lay reader I found his writing to be honest and forthright. Solomon's interest in the psychological aspects of Mozart's life is evident (from the clearly difficult relationship with his father, to his love of wordplay, and even the way he rendered his middle name), and struck me has judiciously handled. Solomon also clearly expects the reader to keep up: small phrases in German, French, and Italian are not translated for the reader, and we are clearly meant to understand references to Marcuse, Herder, Goethe, and the like. This book was published by HarperCollins; in the intervening 28 years I wonder if commercial presses would still make the same assumptions about the basic knowledge a reader brings to a book.
