Back in 1799, Beethoven met the sisters Therese and Josephine Brunsvik (Day 117) and developed an attraction to Josephine. Alas, she was married off in June of that year to the rather older Count Josef Deym.
When Count Deym died in Jan. 1804, Beethoven’s interest was rekindled.
Thirteen letters that Beethoven wrote to the widowed Countess Josephine Deym between 1804 to 1807 were publicly unknown until they were published in 1957. These letters reveal a passion that causes Beethoven’s prose to break down into fragments and underlines:
“For a long period a certain event made me despair of ever achieving any happiness during my life on this earth — ,” wrote Beethoven to Josephine Deym in the spring of 1805, apparently alluding to his encroaching deafness,
but now things are no longer so bad. I have won your heart. Oh, I certainly know what value I ought to attach to this. My activity will again increase and — here I give you a solemn promise that in a short time I shall stand before you more worthy of myself and of you — Oh, if only you would attach some value to this, I mean, to founding my happiness by means of your love — to increasing it — Oh, beloved J[osephine], it is no desire for the other sex that draws me to you, no, it is just you, your whole self with all your individual qualities — that has compelled my regard — this has bound all my feelings — all my emotional power to you — When I came to you — it was with the firm resolve not to let a single spark of love be kindled in me. But you have conquered me — The question is, whether you wanted to do so? or whether you did not want to do so? — No doubt J could answer that question for me sometime — Dear God, there are so many more things I should love to tell you — how much I think of you — what I feel for you — but how weak and poor are those words — at any rate, my words — … (Emily Anderson, ed., Letters of Beethoven, No. 110)
The letters from Beethoven to Josephine Deym also reveal some middle-school-style love intrigue:
As I said, the affair with L [Prince Lichnowsky], my beloved J, is not as bad as was made out to you — Quite by chance L had seen the song ‘An die Hoffnung’ lying about at my place, although I had not noticed this. And he too said nothing about it. But he gathered from this that I must surely have some affection for you. And then when Zmeskall went to him … he asked him if he knew whether I went to see you fairly often. Zmeskall said neither yes nor no. After all, there was nothing he could say, for I had dodged his vigilance as much as possible — Lichnowsky said he thought he had noticed by chance (the song) that I must surely have some affection for you. But he did not say anything to Z about the song; … Meanwhile — you may now be calm about it, seeing that apart from those two persons no one else is involved — (Emily Anderson, ed., Letters of Beethoven, No. 110)
It’s evident from his letter that Beethoven’s wrote the song “An die Hoffnung” (“To Hope”) for Josephine Deym. It is set to a poem by Christoph August Tiedge, a once celebrated writer of didactic verse, from his book Urania: Concerning God, Immortality, and Liberty.
“An die Hoffnung” is about hope:
You who adore the holiness of the night
And veil with your soft and gentle touch
The sorrow which tortures tender hearts,
Oh Hope, uplifted by you, let the
Patient sufferer sense that high above
An angel keeps record of his tears.
#Beethoven250 Day 185
“An die Hoffnung” (Opus 32), 1805
A studio recording by tenor John Mark Ainsley accompanied by the score and English translations.
Upon receiving the song, Josephine Deym wrote to her mother
Dear Beethoven has made me the present of a pretty song “An die Hoffnung”, which he wrote for me to words from Urania.
Keep in mind that during the height of Beethoven’s passion for Josephine Deym in 1805, he was also writing his opera “Leonore” about a devoted wife doing everything she can to save her husband suffering in prison.
#Beethoven250 Day 185
“An die Hoffnung” (Opus 32), 1805
A graduation recital by baritone Pedro Pereira at the Music School of Brasília.
Although Josephine Deym seemed to return Beethoven’s affection for her and to be in love with him, she continued to maintain propriety by addressing him with formal German pronouns. They were not legally prohibited from marrying, but as the widow of a nobleman, Josephine could not have married a commoner like Beethoven without losing her title and very possibly the guardianship of her four children, and Beethoven could not have become the children’s guardian.
#Beethoven250 Day 185
“An die Hoffnung” (Opus 32), 1805
A quarantine video by tenor Florian Huber posted just five weeks ago. The description reads: “May all artists achieve hope, may hope always be on our side!”
Beethoven composed two separate settings of Christoph August Tiedge’s “An die Hoffnung” (“To Hope”). The first in early 1805 was published as Opus 32. A decade later, Beethoven set an expanded version of the poem, which was published as Opus 94.