Text 1

Three Days to See

by Helen Keller

    Helen Keller, blind and deaf from infancy, became a successful lecturer, author and educator with the help of her teacher. In the following essay, she discussed how people should value their ability to see.

   All of us have read thrilling stories in which the hero had only a limited and specified time to live. Sometimes it was as long as a year; sometimes as short as twenty-four hours. But always we were interested in discovering just how the doomed man chose to spend his last days or his last hours. I speak, of course, of free men who have a choice, not condemned criminals whose sphere of activities is strictly delimited.

   Such stories set us thinking, wondering what we should do under similar circumstances. What events, what experiences, what associations should we crowd into those last hours as mortal beings? What happiness should we find in reviewing the past, what regrets?

   Sometimes I have thought it would be an excellent rule to live each day as if we should die tomorrow. Such an attitude would emphasize sharply the values of life. We should live each day with a gentleness, a vigor, and a keenness of appreciation which are often lost when time stretches before us in the constant panorama of more days and months and years to come. There are those, of course, who would adopt the Epicurean motto of "Eat, drink, and be merry;" but most people would be chastened by the certainty of impending death.

   In stories, the doomed hero is usually saved at the last minute by some stroke of fortune, but almost always his sense of values is changed. He becomes more appreciative of the meaning of life and its permanent spiritual values. It has often been noted that those who live, or have lived, in the shadow of death bring a mellow sweetness to everything they do.

   Most of us, however, take life for granted. We know that one day we must die, but usually we picture that day as far in the future. When we are in buoyant health, death is all but unimaginable. We seldom think of it. The days stretch out in an endless vista. So we go about our petty tasks, hardly aware of our listless attitude toward life.

   The same lethargy, I am afraid, characterizes the use of all our faculties and senses. Only the deaf appreciate hearing, only the blind realize the manifold blessings that lie in sight. Particularly does this observation apply to those who have lost sight and hearing in adult life. But those who have never suffered impairment of sight or hearing seldom make the fullest use of these blessed faculties. Their eyes and ears take in all sights and sounds hazily, without concentration, and with little appreciation. It is the same old story of not being grateful for what we have until we lose it, of not being conscious of health until we are ill.

   I have often thought it would be a blessing if each human being were stricken blind and deaf for a few days at some time during his early adult life. Darkness would make him more appreciative of sight; silence would teach him the joys of sound.

   Now and then I have tested my seeing friends to discover what they see. Recently I was visited by a very good friend who had just returned from a long walk in the woods, and I asked her what she had observed. "Nothing in particular," she replied. I might have been incredulous had I not been accustomed to such responses, for long ago I became convinced that the seeing see little.

   How was it possible, I asked myself, to walk for an hour through the woods and see nothing worthy of note? I who cannot see find hundreds of things to interest me through mere touch. I feel the delicate symmetry of a leaf. I pass my hands lovingly about the smooth skin of a silver birch, or the rough shaggy bark of a pine. In spring I touch the branches of trees hopefully in search of a bud, the first sign of awakening Nature after her winter's sleep. I feel the delightful, velvety texture of a flower, and discover its remarkable convolutions; and something of the miracle of Nature is revealed to me. Occasionally, if I am very fortunate, I place my hand gently on a small tree and feel the happy quiver of a bird in full song. I am delighted to have the cool water of a brook rush through my open fingers. To me a lush carpet of pine needles or spongy grass is more welcome than the most luxurious Persian rug. To me the pageant of seasons is a thrilling and unending drama, the action of which streams through my finger tips.

   At times my heart cries out with longing to see all these things. If I can get so much pleasure from mere touch, how much more beauty must be revealed by sight. Yet, those who have eyes apparently see little. The panorama of colour and action which fills the world is taken for granted. It is human, perhaps, to appreciate little that which we have and to long for that which we have not, but it is a great pity that in the world of light the gift of sight is used only as a mere convenience rather than as a means of adding fullness to life.

   If I were the president of a university I should establish a compulsory course in "How to Use Your Eyes". The professor would try to show his pupils how they could add joy to their lives by really seeing what passes unnoticed before them. He would try to awake their dormant and sluggish faculties.

   Suppose you set your mind to work on the problem of how you would use your own eyes if you had only three more days to see. If with the oncoming darkness of the third night you knew that the sun would never rise for you again, how would you spend those three precious intervening days? What would you most want to let your gaze rest upon?
   I, naturally, should want most to see the things which have become dear to me through my years of darkness. You, too, would want to let your eyes rest long on the things that have become dear to you so that you could take the memory of them with you into the night that loomed before you.

   I should want to see the people whose kindness and gentleness and companionship have made my life worth living. First I should like to gaze long upon the face of my dear teacher, Mrs. Anne Sullivan Macy, who came to me when I was a child and opened the outer world to me. I should want not merely to see the outline of her face, so that I could cherish it in my memory, but to study that face and find in it the living evidence of the sympathetic tenderness and patience with which she accomplished the difficult tasks of my education. I should like to see in her eyes that strength of character which has enabled her to stand firm in the face of difficulties, and that compassion for all humanity which she has revealed to me so often.

   I do not know what it is to see into the heart of a friend through that "window of the soul", the eye. I can only "see" through my finger tips the outline of a face. I can detect laughter, sorrow, and many other obvious emotions. I know my friends from the feel of their faces. But I cannot really picture their personalities by touch. I know their personalities, of course, through other means, through the thoughts they express to me, through whatever of their actions are revealed to me. But I am denied that deeper understanding of them which I am sure would come through sight of them through watching their reactions to various expressed thoughts and circumstances, through noting the immediate and fleeting reactions of their eyes and countenance.

   Friends who are near to me I know well, because through the months and years they reveal themselves to me in all their phases; but of causal friends I have only an incomplete impression, an impression gained from a handclasp, from spoken words which I take from their lips with my finger tips, or which they tap into the palm of my hand.

   How much easier, how much more satisfying it is for you who can see to grasp quickly the essential qualities of another person by watching the subtleties of expression, the quiver of a muscle, the flutter of a hand. But does it ever occur to you to use your sight to see into the inner nature of a friend or acquaintance? Do not most of you seeing people grasp casually the outward features of a face and let it go at that?

   For instance, can you describe accurately the faces of five good friends? Some of you can, but many cannot. As an experiment, I have questioned husbands of long standing about the color of their wives' eyes, and often they express embarrassed confusion and admit that they do not know. And, incidentally, it is a chronic complaint of wives that their husbands do not notice new dresses, new hats, and changes in household arrangements.

   The eyes of seeing persons soon become accustomed to the routine of their surroundings, and they actually see only the startling and spectacular. But even in viewing the most spectacular sights the eyes are lazy. Court records reveal every day how inaccurately "eyewitnesses" see. A given event will be "seen" in several different ways by as many witnesses. Some see more than others, but few see everything that is within the range of their vision.

   Oh, the things that I should see if I had the power of sight for just three days!

(1634 words)
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课文一

假如我有三天光明

海伦·凯勒

    海伦·凯勒自幼就又盲又聋，在老师的帮助下成为一名成功的讲师、作家及教育家。在这篇文章里，海伦·凯勒讨论了人们应该怎样珍惜自己的视觉能力。

   我们大家都读过这样一些惊心动魄的故事，故事中的主人公能活的时间有限而具体，或长达一年，或短至24小时。但是我们总是感兴趣的是，行将死亡的人究竟愿意怎样度过他的最后时光。当然，我说的是能进行选择的自由人，而不是活动范围受到严格限制的囚犯。

    这些故事启迪我们思考，诱发我们想象，当我们处于此类情况时，该怎么做呢？作为常人，我们在最后的时刻会急于想干些什么，体验些什么，联想些什么呢？回首往事时，我们又能领略到何种快慰，何种悔恨呢？

    有时我想，如果我们度过每一天时都假定明天即将去世，这会是个极好的准则。这样的处世态度会强烈地突出生命的价值。我们会亲切地、朝气蓬勃地、充满热情地来度过每一天，而这一切却往往在日复一日延续的时光与岁月之中消失。当然，有些人会奉行享乐主义“吃喝玩乐”的信条，但是大多数人则会因死亡就在眼前而使心灵得到净化。

   在故事中，那死神呼唤的主人公通常在最后时刻交上好运而获得拯救，但他的价值观总是会发生变化。他更加珍视生命的意义及其永恒而神圣的价值。人们常常注意到，那些生活在或者曾经生活在死亡的阴影下的人，对他们所做的每一件事都赋予甜美的色彩。

    然而，我们中间大多数人则把生命视为理所当然。我们知道，总有一天我们会死去，但通常我们又把那一天想象为遥远的未来。当我们身体健康时，死亡是件难以想象的事，我们几乎不会想到它。岁月无穷，因此我们忙于种种琐事，几乎意识不到我们漠然的生活态度。

    我们在使用感觉功能时，恐怕也持同样的冷漠态度。只有聋者才知道听觉的重要，只有盲人才理解视觉给人带来的各种恩赐。这一观点特别适用于那些在成年后才丧失视觉和听觉的人。而那些视觉和听觉从未受到损害的人，则很少充分利用这些神圣的官能。他们的眼睛和耳朵模糊地、漫不经心地、不加欣赏地纳入所有的景象和声音。还是那句老话：丢失时才知珍惜，生病时方思健康。

    我常常想，如果每个人在刚成年时某个时候能失明或失聪几天，这或许将是件喜事。黑暗将使他更加珍视景象；而寂静则将教他领略声音的欢乐。

    我不时考一考我的有视力的朋友，以了解他们看到了什么。最近一位好朋友来看我，她是在林中溜达了好一会儿才回来的，我问她观察到了些什么。“没什么特别的东西，”她答道。要不是我对类似的反应已习以为常的话，我是会觉得难以置信的。其实，我早已深信：有视力者所见甚少。

    我问自己，在林中溜达了一个小时而竟未看到什么值得注意的东西，这怎么可能呢？我这个看不见东西的人，仅凭触摸就发现千百种使我感兴趣的东西。我感觉到树叶精致的对称。我用手爱抚着光滑的白烨树皮，或是粗糙的松树皮。春天里，我满怀希望地触摸树枝，寻找一个幼芽——大自然经过冬日沉睡重又苏醒的最初征兆。我摸着花朵上那可爱的天鹅绒般的质地，以及它那叠合巧妙的花苞，于是我领略到了某种大自然的神奇。偶尔，如果十分幸运的话，我把手轻轻搭在一棵小树上，能感到一只小鸟儿尽情欢歌的颤动。我非常高兴让清凉的溪水流过我张开的手指。对我来说，那厚密的松针层或茂盛松软的草地比豪华的波斯地毯更惬意；对我来说，四季的变幻多姿宛如一出动人心弦永不尽止的戏剧，它的情节似流水从我指尖缓缓流过。

    我的心时时在呼号，渴望能见到所有这一切。如果我单靠触摸就能获得如此多的乐趣，那么通过视觉则能领略到更多美景！可是，那些视觉完好的人显然所见甚少。大千世界的五光十色与千姿百态被认为是理所当然。对已获得的不以为然，而对未获得的却期盼不已，这一点或许是人类的特性，可是，非常遗憾，在光明的世界里，天赐的视觉只被当作一种单纯的方便，而不是一种使生活日益完美的手段。

    如果我是大学校长，我就要开设一门必修课，“如何使用你们的眼睛”。教授应尽力向学生演示，如何做到真正看见那些从他们面前不知不觉溜掉的东西，从而为自己的生活增添快乐。他将尽力唤醒他们那些昏睡懒散的感官。

    假定你在开动脑筋研究这一问题：如果你只有三天的视力，你将如何使用你的眼睛呢？如果你知道，当第三天的黑夜来临，太阳就永远不再为你升起，你将如何度过这宝贵的三天呢？你最想让你的目光落在何处？

   当然，我最愿意看的，是那些在我整个失明岁月里对我已变得亲切的东西。你也会想让你的目光长久地停留在那些对你已变得亲切的东西上，这样你就可以把对它们的记忆带进那悄然而来的漫漫长夜中去。

    我要看看那些待我仁慈、温和、友好，从而使我的生活变得有价值的人。首先，我要好好地端详我的恩师安·沙利文·梅丝夫人的脸。她在我年幼的时候就来到我身边，替我打开了外部世界。我不仅想看她的脸形，以便能把它珍藏在我的记忆中，而且还想细细揣摩这张脸，为她那柔情与耐心找到活生生的证据，她正是怀着这种柔情与耐心完成了教育我的艰巨任务。我想在她的眼中看到那种使她坚定地面对各种困难的个性的力量，以及那种经常在我面前流露出来的对全人类的同情心。

   我不知道，透过“心灵之窗”，即眼睛，来探视一个朋友的心是怎么回事。我只能通过我的指尖来“看”一张脸的轮廓。我能探察到欢笑、忧伤和许多其它明显的感情。我根据触摸脸庞的感觉来辨认朋友，但是我的确不能靠触摸来描绘出他们的个性。当然，我通过其它手段，通过他们向我表达的思想，通过他们向我表现出的行动来了解他们的个性。但是，我无法对他们有更深的理解，因为我确信，要达到这种更深的理解，必须要目视他们，观察他们对各种所表达的思想及情况所作的反应，留意他们眼睛里和脸上那种转瞬即逝的反应。

   我熟悉和我亲近的朋友，因为长年累月他们向我显露了自己的各个方面；然而对于偶尔结识的朋友我只有一种不完全的印象，这种印象是仅凭一次握手，一些言语获得的。我用指尖触摸他们的嘴唇，或是靠他们叩击我的手掌而获取这些言语。

    相比之下，你们这些能看见的人，通过观察表情的微妙变化、肌肉的颤动和手的摆动来迅速地把握别人的本质特点，就容易得多， 也令人满意得多。但是，你们可曾想到要用自己的视觉去看透一个朋友或熟人的内在性格？你们这些有视觉的人中的大多数，不就是随便看到一张脸的外部特征就到此为止了吗？

    举例来说，你能准确地描绘出五个好朋友的脸形吗？你们中有些人可以，但许多人不行。作为试验，我曾向一些结婚多年的丈夫询问过他们妻子眼睛的颜色，但他们常常表现出尴尬困惑，承认不知道。顺便提一下，妻子们老是埋怨丈夫不注意她们的新衣服、新帽子以及房间布置中的变化。

    有视觉的人，眼睛很快就习惯了周围的日常事物，因此他实际上只见到一些惊人的、壮观的景象。但是，哪怕是在看最壮观的场面时，他们的眼睛也是懒洋洋的。法院记录天天都表明“目击者”所见是多么地不准确。某一事件可能被几个目击者从几个不同角度“看到”；有些人比别人看得多些，但几乎没有人看到他们视野之内的一切。

    哦，如果我能有即使仅仅三天的光明，我将能见到多少我想看到的东西啊！

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Text 2

Beethoven

by Anne Pimlott Baker

   Beethoven arrived in Vienna on 10 November 1792, not yet twenty-two and eager to begin composition lessons with Haydn. He found himself an attic room but he had scarcely had time to settle in before he received the news that his father had died suddenly, in Bonn, on 18 December. Interestingly, Beethoven did not mention his father's death in his diary, but he wrote to the Elector pointing out that he still needed to support and educate his two young brothers. As a result, the Elector doubled his salary. These quarterly payments continued until March 1794, and his brothers were soon to follow him to Vienna, Carl in 1794 and Johann at the end of 1795.

   Beethoven soon attracted the attention of Prince Carl Lichnowsky, and moved into his apartments as a guest, remaining there for about two years. Lichnowsky became an important patron and Beethoven often played at his Friday morning chamber music concerts. Lichnowsky retained his own string quartet, led by Ignaz Schuppanzigh, who was still a teenager when Beethoven first moved there. Several of Beethoven's compositions had their first performances there, and Beethoven later dedicated his piano sonata op. 13, the Pathetique, to Lichnowsky.

   Beethoven began lessons with Haydn at once and these continued throughout 1793, but he seems to have found them disappointing. "Papa" Haydn was enjoying enormous success at this time and evidently devoted very little attention to his pupil. He set Beethoven to work on counterpoint, using the standard text book, Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum (1725), but Beethoven complained (though not to Haydn) that he was not making any progress because Haydn was much too busy to correct the exercises properly and it seems that for that year the composer Johan Schenk secretly helped Beethoven with the exercises, even going so far as to get Beethoven to copy out any corrections in his own hand so that Haydn would not realize what was going on. Haydn wanted Beethoven to put "pupil of Haydn" on the title page of any works published during these early years in Vienna, but Beethoven refused, telling his friends that although he had had lessons from Haydn, he had learned nothing from him. However, Beethoven kept his grievances to himself, and accompanied Haydn to Eisenstadt, the summer residence of Prince Nikolaus Esterhazy, in the summer of 1793. According to Neefe, Beethoven's former teacher in Bonn, Haydn had asked Beethoven to accompany him on his second concert tour to London, planned for 1794, but before then an embarrassing episode soured their relationship. Although the Elector of Cologne had doubled Beethoven's salary earlier in the year and was sending him an additional 500 florins a year to cover his living expenses, Beethoven still felt short of money, and he got Haydn to write to the Elector on his behalf in November 1793. Haydn pointed out that Beethoven was in debt, and had had to borrow money from him, and asked the Elector to increase Beethoven's salary. He sent copies of five compositions and reported that his pupil had made great progress since coming to Vienna, predicting that Beethoven would become one of the greatest composers in Europe. But in fact , of the five works, only one had been composed in Vienna—the others were revisions of pieces written, and performed, while, he was still in Bonn. The Elector noticed this and replied coolly, "I very much doubt that he has made any important progress in composition during his present stay, and I fear that, as in the case of his first journey to Vienna, he will bring back nothing but debts," and suggested that Beethoven return to Bonn, since he had not composed anything new while studying with Haydn. It looks as though Beethoven had been deceiving Haydn, both about his compositions and his income, and this may well explain why he did not after all accompany Haydn to London in January 1794.

   Relations between the two men remained strained for some years. There is a story that when Beethoven's three Piano Trios, op. 1, were first performed at one of Prince Lichnowsky's soirees, Haydn liked them, but advised Beethoven not to publish the third, the C minor trio, because it was too difficult for the public. Beethoven, who thought it the best, evidently believed this was because Haydn was jealous (although this is unlikely, as Beethoven was very much in Haydn's shadow as a composer at this time), and in fact the trios sold well, and Beethoven made a large profit out of them. However, he dedicated his first three piano sonatas, op. 2, to Haydn, and they were performed at Prince Lichnowsky's house in the early autumn of 1795, just after Haydn's return from England. In the following years, the two men often appeared together in concerts, with Haydn conducting and Beethoven playing the piano, as when Beethoven played his own piano concerto in BI , op. 19, in December 1795, and although Beethoven continued to make carping remarks about Haydn in private, after his death in 1809 Beethoven talked of him in the same breath as Handel and Mozart, and in 1815 wrote in the Tagebuch (his journal) that "portraits of Handel, Bach, Gluck, Mozart and Haydn are in my room ... They can promote my capacity for endurance."

   After Haydn went to England, Beethoven began to feel more secure, and began to compose new works. In Haydn's absence he had lessons with Johann Georg Albrechtsberger, Kapellmeister at St. Stephan's Cathedral, and the most famous teacher of counterpoint in Vienna. It is also likely that he later had lessons in Italian song writing from Salieri. But Beethoven was far more famous at this point as a virtuoso pianist than as a composer and as early as 1793 word was buzzing round Vienna that such playing had not been heard since Mozart. The virtuoso Joseph Gelinek complained that "he is no man; he's a devil. He will play me and all of us to death. And how he improvises!" According to Joseph Mahler, writing in 1803, when Beethoven played, his hands were very still, and seemed to glide over the keys, with his fingers doing the work—there was no tossing around or bending over the keyboard. Carl Czerny noticed that when he played, Beethoven's bearing was very quiet, and noble. No doubt this was the style of playing taught him by Neefe, who trained him in clavichord technique, and Beethoven himself stressed the position of the fingers in his teaching. Beethoven played in the palaces and town houses of the Viennese aristocracy, and his improvisation at the piano was renowned. His first public appearance as pianist and composer was on 29 March 1795 at the Burgtheater (the Imperial court theatre), at the first of the two annual benefit concerts for the widows and orphans of the musicians of Vienna. He performed his Piano Concerto no. 1 in C major, and the story goes that he finished the Rondo only two days before the concert, and as the piano was a semitone flat, he had to play his part in C# major, with its seven sharps. The same year, on 22 November 1795, he made his debut as an orchestral composer in Vienna, when he was commissioned to write the dances for the small ballroom in the Redoutensaal at the annual masked ball for the pension fund in aid of the Society of Artists. This was a great honour—Haydn had been asked in 1792—and he conducted his own twelve minuets and twelve German dances. In February 1796, in the company of Prince Lichnowsky, Beethoven set off on a concert tour lasting several months, and performed in Prague, Dresden, Leipzig and Berlin; in November that year, he again left Vienna to give concerts in Pressburt (Bratislava) and Pest (Budapest). He returned to Prague in 1798.

   By the end of the 1790s Beethoven was beginning to move away from composing only for the piano, although perhaps his most famous piece from this time is the piano sonata in C minor, p. 13, the Pathetique (this title appeared on the first edition), which was published in 1799. His first set of string quartets, op. 18, belongs to this period (they were written in 1798 and published in 1800), and his First Symphony, op. 21 in C, was first performed on 2 April 1800, when he organized a benefit concert at the Burgtheater and hired the orchestra of the Italian Opera. This concert also included the first performance of his Septet, op. 20, which became very popular. He intended to dedicate the First Symphony to Maximilian Franz, the Elector of Cologne, who had settled near Vienna in 1800, but the Elector died in July 1801 before it was published, and it was dedicated to Baron van Swieten instead.

   By 1800, therefore, Beethoven was making a comfortable living as a performer and composer. His salary from the Elector of Cologne had not been paid since March 1794, and he was relying on aristocratic patronage. But after 1795 he no longer had to support his brothers, and he was also making some money from the publication of his works, and from concerts and teaching. Although in general he disliked teaching, he had a soft spot for some of the aristocratic young ladies who came to him for lessons, and when the young countesses Josephine and Therese von Brunsvik came to Vienna from Hungary in 1799, he taught them for four or five hours a day on sixteen consecutive days, and refused any payment. In 1800 Prince Lichnowsky settled an annual salary of 600 florins on him, which was to be continued until Beethoven found a permanent position paying more. But he had not settled down. He seemed incapable of staying at one address for very long, nor did he seem able to form a lasting relationship with a woman, although, according to his friend Franz Wegeler, he was always in love, and in 1795 was even supposed to have proposed marriage to Magdalena Willmann, a singer from Bonn, who had moved to Vienna. But by 1800 his increasing deafness was beginning to have a profound effect on his outlook on life.

   Beethoven probably began to go deaf after 1797, but he tried to keep it a secret, while consulting doctors and trying various remedies. He was extremely anxious about its possible effect on his career as a musician, and embarrassed by its effect on his social life. In the summer of 1801 he wrote to two friends. To Franz Wegeler in Bonn he wrote that he was very busy, with more commissions than he could cope with, and publishers competing to get hold of his latest works, but he was worried about his health, and particularly about his gradual loss of hearing. He had been leading a miserable life for the previous two years because of his deafness, and had avoided human company because he found it hard to tell people that he was deaf. "I live entirely in my music". Two days later he wrote to Karl Amenda, a more recent friend, on the same lines, expressing the anxiety that his best years would pass "without my being able to achieve all that my talent and my strength have commanded me to do". His fear that his deafness would prevent him from realizing his artistic potential led him to contemplate taking his own life, but in October 1802, he said that he had rejected suicide, and was resigned to his condition. He explained that his deafness was the reason why he had been withdrawing from people's company, because he found it so humiliating not being able to hear, but he did not want to tell people about it. Although tempted to kill himself, "the only thing that held me back was my art. For indeed it seemed to me impossible to leave this world before I had produced all the works that I felt the urge to compose." During the summer of 1802 he had spent six months in Heiligenstadt, thirteen miles outside Vienna, on the advice of one of his doctors who thought that his hearing might improve in the peace and quiet away from Vienna. But his pupil, Ferdinand Ries visited him in the summer, and during a walk in the woods pointed out a shepherd playing a flute made out of an elder twig. Beethoven could not hear it, and this made him very morose. As the winter approached he realized that his hearing was no better, and that it was likely to get worse, and he might end up totally deaf.

   However, it was some years before this happened, and Beethoven coped with the problem to a certain extent by giving up those aspects of his career which were most affected by his defective hearing. He also appeared less frequently at aristocratic soirees, and gave up plans to go on concert tours. It could be argued that Beethoven's deafness helped the development of his art: isolated from the world, and unable to perform, he could devote all his time to composing. He was already composing less at the piano, and the first of his bound sketchbooks, in which he made detailed drafts of the works in progress, date from 1798. In his panic, at the beginning, Beethoven may have believed himself to be deafer than he really was. In the early years of his deafness, he suffered from tinnitus (humming and buzzing in the ears), and loud noises caused him pain. In 1804 his friend Stephan von Breuning wrote to Franz Wegeler about the terrible effect his gradual loss of hearing was having on Beethoven: it had caused him to distrust his friends, and he was becoming very difficult to be with. But Beethoven did not start using an ear trumpet until 1814 and his earliest Conversation Books, in which his friends wrote when he could no longer hear what they were saying, only began in 1818.

   During the summer of 1803 Beethoven composed one of his most famous orchestral works, the Symphony no. 3, op. 55, the Eroica, which he originally entitled Bonaparte. The inspiration for this title derived from Napoleon's expedition to Egypt in 1789, and the second movement, a funeral march, was inspired by the rumours of Nelson's death at the Battle of Aboukir Bay. To Beethoven, as to so many, Napoleon Bonaparte had seemed to embody the ideals of the French Revolution and "enlightened" leadership, and in many homes throughout Europe portraits of Napoleon replaced even pictures of Christ. But as Napoleon's armies marched into neighbouring countries doubts crept in. As early as 1802, when Hoffmeister, Beethoven's publisher in Leipzig, suggested that Beethoven compose a sonata in celebration of Napoleon, Beethoven angrily rejected the idea because he felt that Napoleon had betrayed the Revolution in signing the Concordat with the Pope in 1801, re-establishing the Catholic religion in France. He said that while he might have composed such a work once, now everything was slipping back into the old ways. However, it seems likely that Beethoven originally wanted to dedicate the symphony to Napoleon, but because his patron, Prince Lobkowitz, wanted the rights to it, he changed his mind, and gave it the title Bonaparte instead. There is a well-known story that when Beethoven heard the news that Napoleon had proclaimed himself Emperor in May 1804, he tore the title page in half, in despair and rage that Napoleon was just an ordinary person after all, who would trample on the rights of man and would become a tyrant. The publisher subsequently gave it the title Sinfonia Eroica, although the title page also says it was written "to celebrate the memory of a great man". There could be a very straightforward reason for the change of title. In 1803 Beethoven was thinking of visiting Paris or even moving there permanently, and he might have thought it wise to dedicate it to Napoleon. But he changed his mind about Paris, and meanwhile war between Austria and France was imminent, and the censors were clamping down on any signs of sympathy with the French. Beethoven might well have felt that to keep "Bonaparte" as a title or dedication would be frowned on in Vienna, and so removed the title, although on 26 August 1804 he was writing to Breitkopf and H?rtel, the publishers, that "the title of the symphony is really Bonaparte". According to Baron de Trmont, a French official in Vienna during the French occupation of 1809, Beethoven continued to admire Napoleon as one who had risen from humble origins. The symphony had a mixed reception, and many people felt it was far too long. Although Beethoven refused to make any changes, when it was published in 1805 he added a note that because of its great length it should be played near the beginning of a convert before the audience got too tired.

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课文二

贝多芬

安妮·平罗特·贝克

    贝多芬于1792年11月10日抵达维也纳。他年龄还不到22岁，急于向海顿学习作曲。他替自己找了一间阁楼，可几乎还没来得及搬进去，就得知父亲12月18号在波恩突然去世的消息。有趣的是，贝多芬没有在日记中提到父亲的去世，但他给汉诺威选侯去信说，自己仍然需要资助两个弟弟上学；结果选侯把他的薪水增加了一倍，这些按季付的薪水一直延续到1794年，他的两个弟弟卡尔、约翰也分别于1794年、1795年年底先后跟随他来到了维也纳。

    贝多芬很快就引起了卡尔·里奇洛乌斯基王子的注意，并且作为座上客搬进了王子的宫殿；他在此度过了两年。里奇洛乌斯基成了主要的资助人，贝多芬经常在他的礼拜五上午室内音乐会上演奏。里奇洛乌斯基有自己的弦乐四重奏乐队，由伊格纳兹·叔番泽领队。当贝多芬搬来时，他还是个少年。贝多芬的几部作品是在那儿首先演奏的，后来贝多芬将钢琴奏鸣曲作品第13号《悲怆》献给了里奇洛乌斯基。

    贝多芬立即师从海顿，课程一直延续到1793年，但他似乎发现这些课程令人失望。海顿“爸爸”当时沉浸在巨大成功的喜悦之中，显然很少顾及自己的弟子。他让贝多芬学习复调音乐，采用标准的教材，弗克斯的《艺术津梁》（1725），但贝多芬抱怨自己没有取得任何进步（虽然不是对海顿抱怨），因为海顿太忙，不能恰当地纠正练习中的错误；在这一年，似乎是作曲家约翰·尚克暗中帮助贝多芬进行练习，甚至到了让贝多芬把修改的错误自己抄写出来的地步，这样海顿就不会意识到所发生的事情。在维也纳的头几年，海顿要贝多芬在任何发表作品的头页标上“海顿弟子”，但贝多芬拒绝了。他告诉朋友们，尽管他跟海顿学，其实什么也没学到。然而，贝多芬忍受着委屈，在1793年的夏天，陪海顿来到尼可劳斯·埃斯特海王子在艾森施塔特的避暑住宅；据贝多芬从前在波恩的老师尼弗说，海顿叫贝多芬陪他去伦敦进行第二次巡回演出，这是为1794年而计划的，但在这以前，一个令人尴尬的插曲恶化了他们的关系。尽管科隆的选侯在年初就把他的薪水增加了一倍，而且每年还另外送给他500弗罗林作为生活费用，贝多芬仍然觉得手头过紧。1793年他要海顿亲自给选侯写信，海顿指出贝多芬欠了债，不得不向他借钱，并且要选侯增加贝多芬的薪水；他附上5首曲子，并报告说，他的学生自从来到维也纳后取得了很大的进步，他预言贝多芬将成为欧洲最伟大的作曲家之一。可事实上，这5首曲子中，只有一首是在维也纳作的——其它几首是他修订的在波恩时写的演奏作品。选侯意识到这一情况，冷冷地答道，“我十分怀疑，他目前是否真的在作曲方面取得了重大进步，而且我担心，他会像第一次去维也纳那样，除了债务外什么也不会带回来。”既然与海顿在一起什么曲子也没作，选侯建议贝多芬回到波恩。在作曲和收入方面，似乎贝多芬一直在欺骗海顿，这也许能充分地解释，为什么1794年1月贝多芬最终没有陪海顿去英国。

    两人的关系在以后几年里处于紧张状态。有这样一个传说：当贝多芬的三个钢琴三重奏的第1号作品首次在里奇洛乌斯基王子的晚会上演奏时，海顿对这些作品十分欣赏，但建议他不要发表第3首，即C小调三重奏，因为这首曲子对公众来说难度太大；贝多芬认为这是最好的一首曲子，显然认为这是海顿对他心怀嫉妒（尽管这是不可能的，因为作为一位作曲家，贝多芬当时被海顿的盛名遮挡得厉害），事实上这些三重奏销路很好，贝多芬因此赚了一大笔钱。然而他把钢琴奏鸣曲，作品第2号的头3首献给了海顿，并于1795年秋初在奇洛乌斯基王子的家中上演，此时海顿刚刚从伦敦回来。在以后的数月里，两人经常在音乐会上同时露面，海顿任指挥，贝多芬弹钢琴，就像1795年12月上演贝多芬的降B大调钢琴奏鸣曲作品第19号时一样。尽管贝多芬一直在背地里抱怨海顿，1809年海顿死后，贝多芬以谈论亨德尔和莫扎特那样的口吻谈论他，并于1815年在日记中写到：“亨德尔、巴赫、格鲁克、莫扎特及海顿的画像在我的房间里……他们能够增强我的忍耐力。”

    在海顿去英国后，贝多芬开始觉得更为安全，也开始了新的创作。当海顿不在的时候，他求教圣斯弟凡大教堂的指挥以及维也纳最著名的复调音乐教师约翰·乔治·阿巴拉彻斯柏格。他后来还向萨里埃利学习意大利歌曲创作。不过，此时贝多芬作为钢琴演奏家的名声远远大于他作为作曲家的名声。早在1793年就有人说：自莫扎特以来，还从未听到过如此娴熟的演奏；演奏家约瑟夫·格林内克曾抱怨道，“他不是人，他是魔鬼，他将用钢琴把我和所有的人都弹死。他多么精通即兴演奏啊！”根据约瑟夫·马勒1803年的记载，贝多芬在演奏时，他的手十分平稳，手指在键盘上流利地滑动，身体丝毫不会晃来晃去或俯向键盘。卡尔·泽尼注意到：当贝多芬弹奏钢琴时，举止镇静，仪态优美。毫无疑问，这是尼弗教他的演奏风格，尼弗训练过他古钢琴演奏法。在教学中，贝多芬自己很注重指法到位。贝多芬在宫廷及维也纳贵族的城内住宅演奏，他的即兴演奏才能也名扬天下。1995年3月29日，他首次作为钢琴家和作曲家在柏基剧院（帝国宫廷剧院）公开露面，出席为维也纳音乐家的遗孀和孤儿而举行的年度慈善音乐会两次中的第一次。他演奏了C大调第1号钢琴协奏曲，据说他是在这次音乐会前两天才完成《回旋曲》的，因演奏的是一台降半音钢琴，他不得不用带7个升记号的升C大降演奏。同年11月22日，他又首次作为交响乐作曲家在维也纳登台表演。正是此时，贝多芬参加了为艺术家协会募集养老金基金的年度化装舞会，他受委托为里腾塞尔的小型舞厅写舞曲。这可是一个很大的荣誉——海顿曾于1792年受过此类委托——而且贝多芬亲自指挥了自己的12首小步舞曲和12首日尔曼舞曲。1796年2月，在里奇洛乌斯基王子的陪同下，贝多芬开始了延续几个月的巡回演出，并且在布拉格、德累斯顿、莱比锡及柏林等地进行了演出；当年11月，他再一次离开维也纳去普雷斯特（布拉迪斯拉发）和佩斯（布达佩斯）举行音乐会，于1798年回到布拉格。

    18世纪90年代末期，贝多芬开始不再只写钢琴曲，尽管他这一时期最有名的作品可能是1799年发表的C大调钢琴奏鸣曲，作品第13号《悲怆》（第一版的标题）。这一时期他还完成了第一组弦乐四重奏，作品第18号（写于1798年，于1800年发表）；1800年4月2日他在柏基剧院组织了一次慈善音乐会，雇用了意大利歌剧院的交响乐队，他的C调第一交响乐，作品第21号在音乐会上首次演出。音乐会上还首次演奏了他的七重奏，作品第20号，后来很受欢迎。他打算将第一交响乐献给科隆的选帝侯马克西姆莲·弗兰兹，而弗兰兹1800年定居维也纳。但在作品尚未发表之前，选帝侯于1801年7月逝世，作品于是献给了拜伦·凡·斯韦登。

    这样，到了1800年，贝多芬作为演奏家和作曲家过上了很舒适的生活。选侯从1794年3月起就不再支付他薪水，此后他依靠贵族的赞助。但从1795年以后，弟弟不再需要他的资助。他还通过发表作品、办音乐会以及教学赚些钱。总的来说，他不喜欢教学，但他特别喜欢有些上门求教的年轻贵妇。当年轻的伯爵夫人约瑟芬和塞利斯·范·布伦斯维克1779年从匈牙利来到维也纳,贝多芬连续16天每天教她们4至5个小时,并且拒绝接受报酬。1800年，里奇洛乌斯基王子每年提供给贝多芬600弗罗林，一直延续到贝多芬找到一份薪水更高的固定工作为止。但贝多芬没有定居下来。他似乎不能在一个地方呆得太久，也不能与一个女人保持长久的关系；但据他的朋友弗兰兹·韦吉说，他经常坠入爱河，1795年人们甚至认为他已向从波恩搬到维也纳的歌手马格达林娜·威尔曼求婚。但是，到1800年，他耳聋的加重开始对他的人生观产生巨大的影响。

    贝多芬可能在1797年开始耳聋，但他保守着秘密，一边求医问药。他对失聪可能给他的音乐事业带来的影响十分忧虑，对它给他的社会生活带来不便也感到尴尬。1801年的夏天他给两位朋友去信。他给波恩的弗兰兹·韦吉来写信说，他很忙，过多的委托让他难以对付，出版商们争先抢购他的最新作品，但他很担心自己的健康，特别是他那渐渐丧失的听觉。由于耳聋，两年以来他过着悲惨的生活，避免与人交际，因为他很难向人们说他是个聋子。“我完全沉浸在音乐之中。”两天以后，他去信给长尔·阿芒达，一位近来结交的朋友，在信中以同样的口吻表达了自己的忧虑，说他的黄金年代将匆匆流逝，却“不能充分发挥自己的才能和力量”。由于担心耳聋会阻止他挖掘自己的艺术潜力，贝多芬产生了轻生的念头，但在1802年，他说自己摒弃了自杀的念头，并接受了这一现实。他解释说，耳聋是他避免与人相聚的原因，因为他发现失去听觉是十分丢人的事情，他不愿向人们吐露真情。尽管有自杀的念头，“但唯一能把我从死亡线上拉回来的是我的艺术。因为在我还没有完成我急于想作的曲子之前，离开这个世界对我来说的确是不可能的。”1802年夏天，在他的一位医生的建议下，他在离维也纳13英里的海力施塔特度过了6个月。这位医生认为，他的听觉可能在远离维也纳的安宁的环境中得到恢复。但他的学生费迪南·利斯在这年夏天来拜访他，在林中散步时，费迪南指向一个吹着用接骨木树枝做的笛子的牧羊人。可贝多芬听不到笛声，这件事使他闷闷不乐。随着冬天的来临，他发现自己的听觉没有改善，而且有可能恶化，他可能完全变聋。

    然而，离他彻底失聪还有好几年，而贝多芬对付听觉丧失的办法，是在某种程度上放弃他事业中受听觉缺陷影响最严重的方面。他也不常在贵族们的晚会上露面，并且放弃了巡回演出的计划。可以说贝多芬的失聪促进了他的艺术发展：离群索居，不能表演，他可以把时间都花在作曲方面。他已经开始减少在钢琴上作曲，而他的第一本作曲本是从1789年开始的，记录了创作过程中详细的草稿。在最初的恐慌中，贝多芬也许觉得自己比实际情况要聋得多。在他听觉丧失的初期，他的耳鸣（耳中有翁翁作响之声），大一点的声音会引起疼痛。1804年，他的好友斯蒂凡·范·布罗宁给弗兰兹·韦吉勒去信，诉说了听觉渐渐丧失给贝多芬带来的可怕的影响；他失去对朋友们的信赖，也难与人相处。但是，贝多芬直至1814年才开始使用助听器。当他听不到朋友们说些什么时，他们用笔把说的话写在他的谈话簿上，而他最早使用的谈话簿只是在1818年才开始。

    在1803年夏天，贝多芬写下了他最有名的交响乐曲之一，第3交响曲，作品第55号，即《英雄交响乐》。这一作品最初取名《波拿巴》。这一标题的灵感来自拿破伦1789年对埃及的远征。作品的第二乐章是葬礼进行曲，灵感来自纳尔逊在阿布基尔湾战股中死去的谣传。对贝多芬来说，正如对多数人一样，拿破伦·波拿巴似乎体现了法国革命和“开明”领袖的理想，在欧洲的许多家庭，拿破伦的画像甚至代替了基督的画像。但是，当拿破伦的部队开进邻近国家时，人们产生了怀疑。早在1802年，当贝多芬在莱比锡的出版商霍夫梅斯特建议贝多芬作一首奏鸣曲来纪念拿破伦时，贝多芬愤怒地拒绝了这一想法，因为他认为拿破伦于1801年与教皇签订协定，在法国恢复天主教，背叛了革命。他说他本来要写这样一首曲子，但现在一切都回到了原来的样子。然而，有可能贝多芬原本打算将这首交响乐献给拿破伦，但由于自己的资助人洛布洛维兹王子想要它的版权，他便改变了主意，就用《波拿巴》这一名字代替了。有一个众所周知的故事，说当贝多芬听到拿破伦于1804年5月称帝后，出于绝望和愤怒，把作品的首页撕成两半，因为拿破伦不过是一个凡夫俗子，要践踏人权，成为暴君。尽管作品首页上仍写着“为了纪念一位伟人”，出版商后来给作品取名《英雄交响乐》。作品改名可能还有一个很直接的原因。1803年贝多芬打算访问巴黎甚至在那儿永久定居，他也许觉得把作品献给拿破伦是明智的。但是他改变了对巴黎的看法，同时，奥法之战即将来临，检查官正在取缔任何对法国友好的表示。尽管1804年8月26日，贝多芬在写给出版商布莱科普夫及哈特尔的信中说“作品的标题的确是波拿巴”，他可能觉得保留“波拿巴”这一标题或献词会使维也纳人感到不高兴，因此，他去掉了这一标题。据1809年法国占领时期驻维也纳的一名法国军官拜伦·德·特利特说，贝多芬一直仰慕从低微身份发迹的拿破伦。人们对这首交响乐的反应好坏不一，许多人认为它太长。尽管贝多芬拒绝作任何更改，当作品在1805年发表时，他增加了一条注释，说因为作品太长，必须在音乐会开始后不久观众还不太疲劳的时候进行演奏。

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