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Full download The Notebooks of Alexander Skryabin 1st Edition Aleksandr Nikolayevich Scriabin file pdf all chapter on 2024
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The Notebooks
of Alexander Skryabin
Alexander Skryabin in 1914 (© Skryabin Museum, Moscow)
The Notebooks
of Alexander Skryabin
T R A N S L AT E D B Y S I M O N N I C H O L L S
AND MICHAEL PUSHKIN
A N N O TAT I O N S A N D C O M M E N TA RY
BY SIMON NICHOLLS
1
1
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
Dedicated to the memory of Dr. Oliver Smith (1979–2013)
CONTENTS
List of illustrations xi
Foreword xiii
Vladimir Ashkenazy
Editorial procedure xv
The Translations xv
Russian dates xvii
Acknowledgements xix
Introduction 1
Simon Nicholls
CULTURAL CONTEXT 1
BIOGRAPHICAL ELEMENTS 5
The Notebooks:
I. A SINGLE SHEET, WRITTEN AT THE AGE OF ABOUT SIXTEEN 49
II. PERIOD OF THE FIRST SYMPHONY, AROUND 1900 50
III. CHORUS FROM SYMPHONY NO. 1 51
IV. LIBRETTO FOR AN OPERA, WRITTEN AFTER SYMPHONY NO. 1
BUT BEFORE 1903 52
V. NOTEBOOK, SUMMER 1904, SWITZERLAND 61
VI. NOTEBOOK, 1904–5 66
VII. NOTEBOOK, 1905–6 102
vii
viii Contents
Commentary 175
Simon Nicholls
A ‘PHILOSOPHER-MUSICIAN’? 177
THE INFLUENCE OF PHILOSOPHY
Music and philosophy 178
Skryabin’s reading 179
Ernest Renan 180
Greek philosophy 181
German idealism 183
Russian philosophy and Russian symbolism 186
Skryabin in 1914 ii
Lyubov′ Petrovna Skryabina (Shchetinina) 5
Lyubov′ Alexandrovna Skryabina 7
Sergei Taneyev 9
Vasilii Safonov 10
Natal′ya Sekerina 12
Sergei Trubetskoy 13
Vera Skryabina (Isakovich) 14
Tat′yana de Schloezer 16
Vésenaz 17
Yulii Éngel′ 18
H. P. Blavatsky 20
Konstantin Bal′mont 22
Skryabin’s funeral procession (press photograph) 23
Russkie propilei: title page of the original edition, 1919 29
Skryabin and Baltrušaitis, 1913, Petrovskoe 32
Belotte 64
Reproductions from the original edition:
Two drawings by Skryabin 85
Two excerpts from the Preliminary Action in Skryabin’s manuscript 125, 133
Vladimir Solovyov 187
Vyacheslav Ivanov 188
Les Lilas, Vésenaz 189
Margarita Morozova 196
Leonid Sabaneyev with Tat′yana de Schloezer and Alexander Skryabin 225
Mikhail Gershenzon 228
xi
FOREWORD
Evaluation of Skryabin’s music is not an easy task. His idiom is often dismissed—
his early music simply as too Chopinesque and his late music as the sense-
less product of an amateur philosopher. Skryabin’s orchestral music, perhaps
excluding The Poem of Ecstasy, is not often performed.
But his piano music survives. He was, after all, an excellent pianist, and his
piano sonatas and many other pieces are often an integral part of many pian-
ists’ repertoire—and not only those of the Russian school. Sergei Rachmaninov
played a lot of Skryabin’s music, and closer to our time Svyatoslav Richter also
had many of his pieces in his repertoire. There are countless CDs available of
his piano music played by pianists from many countries. Evidently his idiom in-
spires artistic endeavour in the minds and souls of many performers.
It would be pointless to go here into detailed analysis of Skryabin’s idiom
and the message of his final product. One tends to simply accept the fact of
the survival of his spirit and register that his message has a meaning inherently
connected with our spiritual existence—and that is one hundred years after
his death.
There is evidence that (just before 1903) Skryabin once wrote: ‘I am the
apotheosis of world creation. I am the aim of aims, the end of ends’. As a very
frequent visitor to the Skryabin Museum in Moscow in the 1950s and 1960s,
I often heard the director of the museum, Mrs. Tatyana Shaborkina, telling vis-
itors that shortly before his death Skryabin uttered a statement to this very same
effect—obviously meaning that once he ceased to exist, the world would also
come to an end. Whatever he might have meant, and whatever his philosophy,
Skryabin’s music is still around and is important to many of us.
Vladimir Ashkenazy
xiii
E D I TO R I A L P RO CE D U R E
The Translations
We have sought to give as accurate a rendering of the Russian text as possible.
Following Mikhail Gershenzon, Skryabin’s first editor, we have not attempted
to correct the ellipses, inconsistencies, and grammatical lapses due to the
composer’s hasty noting down, for private use, of thoughts as they occurred
to him. Our aim in translating the poetical writing was to adhere as closely as
possible to the sense of the Russian, rather than to try to reproduce metres or
rhymes which Skryabin used.1
In Skryabin’s writing, as in Russian writing about Skryabin, words and con-
cepts recur frequently. Russian and English words overlap in their meanings but
do not necessarily coincide exactly, and so it is not always possible to achieve
a word-for-word equivalence. We have, however, attempted to reproduce repe-
titions to some extent, when these constitute a stylistic feature with which the
Russian language is more comfortable than is English. It may be helpful to pro-
vide a short glossary of some words in this key vocabulary which have several
equivalents or present other special features:
xv
xvi Editor ial P rocedure
We have worked from original sources wherever possible, but references are
made to good English translations of Russian and German texts when avail-
able. In the case of Boris de Schloezer’s Skryabin, translated into English as
Scriabin: Artist and Mystic,7 the excerpts quoted have been newly translated, with
the page reference of the original given first and that of the published transla-
tion following. Translations of the titles of all Russian sources are given in the
bibliography.
Russian dates
Throughout Skryabin’s lifetime Russia used the Julian Calendar ( = ‘Old Style’,
OS), gradually abandoned in most of Europe after 1582. Russia adjusted its
dates to the Gregorian calendar ( = ‘New Style’, NS) in 1918. Calendar dates
in Russia in this book are given in Old Style, events elsewhere in New Style. In
the nineteenth century, the Julian calendar was behind the Gregorian by twelve
days; from the end of February 1900, the discrepancy increased to thirteen days.
Where dates are given in both styles, Old Style comes first.
Notes
1. See the section ‘Skryabin’s poetic language’, 203–07.
2. William Leatherbarrow. “Conservatism in the age of Alexander I and Nicholas I.” In A History of
Russian Thought, edited by William Leatherbarrow and Derek Offord. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2010, 110.
3. Alexandre Scriabine. Notes et réflexions, carnets inédits. Translated with introduction and notes
by Marina Scriabine. Paris: Editions Klincksieck, 1979.
4. Russkie propilei (Russian propylaea—‘propylaea’ being the word used in classical Greek for a
monumental gateway) was an annual publication of material relating to Russian thought and
literature, which appeared from 1915 to 1919 with the exception of 1917. See the section
‘Mikhail Gershenzon and Russkie propilei’, 228–29.
5. Alexander Skrjabin. Prometheische Phantasien. Translated and with introduction by Oskar von
Riesemann. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1924.
6. A. Eaglefield Hull. A Great Russian Tone-Poet, Scriabin. London: Kegan, Paul, Trench, Trubner,
1916, 258; Alfred J. Swan, Scriabin. London: John Lane, 1923, 27.
7. B. F. Shletser. Skryabin. Tom I: Lichnost′, Misteriya. Berlin: Grani, 1923. English transla-
tion: Boris de Schloezer. Scriabin: Artist and Mystic. Translated by Nicolas Slonimsky. With
introductory essays by Marina Scriabine. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book could not have been written without the generous help of Russian
institutions and of many individuals. Friends and colleagues have helped with
obtaining source materials, some very scarce, and with advice. I am indebted to
the following:
In Moscow
Andrei Golovin, composer
Alina Ivanova-Skryabina, journalist
Aleksandr S. Skryabin, president of the A. N. Skryabin Foundation
Professor Vladimir Tropp, head of piano faculty, Gnesin Academy, pro-
fessor of piano, Tchaikovsky Conservatoire
xix
Another random document with
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“There is no fear,” he asserted. “There is nothing to fear. Oh, girl—
my girl! With hate gone, and love come in, there’s nothing in the
wide world to fear!”
February was well along when first they saw the glade together.
Morgan Anderson and Gard had organized a company which, later,
was to exploit the mine. Gard had seen to it that Sandy Larch had an
interest, and Mrs. Hallard. Kate Hallard had gone away from
Sylvania, but her matters were in good hands. She had sold her
business to Sing Fat, and gone to California.
“For one thing,” she had said to Helen, when the two had a long
talk together. “I’m goin’ to learn t’ talk decent. I can’t stand it.
Sometimes when I’m sittin’ still, not sayin’ a word, jes’ listenin’ to
you, seems’s if the language I’m thinkin’ in is makin’ a noise, it is so
howlin’ bad.
“Don’t you think I don’t know; ner don’t you b’lieve it don’t make
no difference. It makes a difference inside me. I’m sick of it. Sick of
all ’t means to me. I never had a chance to find it out before; but now
I know, an’ I can’t bear it. I’m goin’ t’ learn somethin’, an’ then, so
long’s I always want to work—you couldn’t make a lady o’ the likes o’
me, not if you laid the money on with a trowel,—I’m goin’ to work at
something worth while, an’ if I ain’t too old I’m goin’ to learn to be a
nurse. Anyhow, it’s good-by the eatin’ house fer mine!”
Helen and Gard went with the first outfit of mining-supplies to the
claim. These were taken by wagon to the foot of the mountain, and
thence, up the trail, on the backs of the mules that had pulled them.
Gard had gone for Jinny, bringing her by rail to Yuma, their point of
departure, and she and Helen had become friends forthwith.
Together they led the procession up the ancient wash; for Helen
insisted upon walking, and her saddle horse and Gard’s followed in
the rear.
The glade lay in the pleasant afternoon sunshine much as it had
done the day that Gard said good-by to it. A big live-oak branch had
fallen across the ocotilla bed where he had often rested. Helen
surveyed the rude structure with quivering lips, as he pulled the
branch away.
Sandy Larch was unloading the animals, piling up the stores, and
getting things into shape, with the help of the three men of the outfit.
By the big fireplace against the rock Wing Chang, who had cast in his
fortunes with the new company, was taking stock of Gard’s culinary
apparatus.
“What do you think of it, Chang?” the latter asked, as the cook
investigated the upturned bean-pot.
“Where you catchee him?” the Chinaman demanded, much
mystified.
“I made it. Made them all.” Gard waved a hand at the various fire-
blackened clay pots. Chang tapped the bean-kettle with an
investigating knuckle, testing its soundness.
“Him no clacked,” he said, with a grunt. “Mebby you no clacked;
mebby so allee lightee.”
And no further expression of opinion could be won from him.
Helen made a swift round of the place, Gard following, scarcely
able to believe in his own happiness. She inspected the cabin, and
cast her vote for living outside it. The seats and tables that Gard had
contrived gave her great delight, and she rejoiced in the flaming
green of the volunteer crop of oats into which Jinny had already
found her wilful way.
“I dare say your gold-mine’s all right, Gard,” Sandy said, coming
up to survey the oat patch, “but if it shouldn’t be, there’s another one
right on this here plain, if that water was turned acrost it.”
“I vum!” He pulled a head of oats and examined it. “The Palo
Verde’s a howlin’ wilderness,” he avowed, “to what a man could have
here.”
Gard laughed as he led Jinny ignominiously out of her green field.
“No reason why you shouldn’t be that man,” said he. “It’s
government land, all ready to be entered upon.”
“If that’s a fact,” was Sandy’s reply, “an’ you ain’t got no intentions
on it, then Sandy Larch, cow-punch, is likely to blossom out as A.
Larch, rancherio. Can’t you see me a swellin’ señor?”
Wing Chang’s bright fire was lighting up the trees and rocks when
Helen, who had been bestowing her belongings inside the cabin,
came out with something in her hands.
“What is this?” she demanded of Gard, still hovering near.
He took the big shell from her and stirred the palo verde thorns
about, his mind a surge of emotions.
“What are those for?” Helen asked, again.
“Why,” he said, at last, “they’re my tally of the days I lived in the
glade.”
She looked at them, in the twilight, her face touched with wonder.
“How many, many there seem to be,” she murmured.
“There ought to be somewhere about seven hundred, I suppose,”
was Gard’s reply. “We don’t need ’em any more. Let’s help along the
blaze with ’em.”
She caught his hands, with a little cry of dismay.
“No! No!” cried she, “You must not destroy them! Your record of
days; hard, thorny days.” She covered the thorns with one hand, in a
passionate gesture of protection.
“They were good days,” he answered, trying to comfort her. “I got a
lot of good out of them.”
“But oh, the price you paid!” Tears glistened in her eyes.
They were in the shadow of a big live-oak, and he drew her to him.
“It was sure a man’s price,” he said, looking into her face. “But I
got full value for it.”
The night was far spent when Gard awoke. A late moon rode high
in the heavens, flooding the glade with white light. The familiarity of
the scene bewildered his rousing consciousness. The circling trees,
the murmur of water, the far-seeming faint glow of embers in the
great fireplace, his narrow ocotilla bed with its bear-skin covering:
how well he knew them all! Had he but slept and dreamed, to
awaken after all to the daily round of his accustomed solitude?
He raised himself upon one elbow. On the cot which they had
brought for her, there, within reach of his hand, Helen lay sleeping. A
beam of the white light sifted down through encircling trees and fell
across her face, round which the night wind had fluttered her hair to
soft disorder. Her head was thrown back, her chin nestling in one
supporting palm. The pure, tender outline of brow and cheek thrilled
him as he gazed, his soul touched to awe.
Long, long he looked, worship and wonder stirring the deeps of his
nature. It was no dream; she was there beside him; there was no
drede.
He sank back upon his pillow, tears of supreme happiness
brimming his eyes, and yielded him wholly to the quiet and peace of
the large place.
THE END.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and
variations in spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings
as printed.
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