Book #49

My Dearest Father by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

A selection of personal correspondence between Mozart and his most important mentor and supporter, his father. 

A not incredibly interesting collection of collections between Mozart and his father, Leopold. Unless overly (and I mean overly) interested in the composer and his life, you won’t take much from this.

Both men write to each other in the awkward state that is the result of parental lectures and childlike defences. With father trying to make son see the frivolity of his expenses, and the fact that he’s slowly surrounding the family with debt, and the son hotly justifying his failure to account for every penny, their love and frustration for each other was abundantly clear.

Other than the family commentary, however, the correspondence is filled with arias, symphonies, compositions, orchestras, and a thousand other terms I wasn’t familiar with. Names, faces, places; all swept by as a fog as I gave up the energy to understand.

My favourite part was when Mozart got drunk and sang, “O you prick, lick my arse,” but that probably just says more about me than anything else.