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Eric Sams
A Schumann
Primer?
The Musical
Times,
Nov. 1970 (pp. 1096-1097) © The Estate of Eric Sams, 1970
[.pdf
printable version]
Und dies
geheimnisvolle Buch…
Ist
dir
es
nicht Geleit genug?
goethe
This is the
last of a series of articles1 which began by
inferring, solely from Schumann's music, a complete new cipher-system with some
unusual features. That system, and those features, were later traced to Johann Klüber's
Kryptographik.
Here are some further clues lo the conclusion that Schumann knew his Klüber.
In what
follows each speaks for himself, in literal translation. The phrases in
parentheses have been added in order to summarize or explain; similarly, the
asterisks mark off passages from the same letter or chapter, and the dots
indicate omissions from those passages. All the Schumann references are to be
found in the usual main sources2 except the
Heidelberg
notebook.3
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JOHANN KLÜBER
(1763-1837)
from Kryptographik
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ROBERT SCHUMANN
(1810-1856)
from
letters, reviews, etc.
1827-54
|
The student (1827-30)
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(published at the) Tübingen branch of J.G.Cotta (a branch which supplied
Schumann’s father’s bookshop)
(written
in)
Heidelberg,
1809 (where Klüber the famous German jurist was then a famous professor)
*
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I have
had to rummage all through (my father's) library
*
I would
rather go lo
Heidelberg,
to hear the most famous German jurists ... because the most famous
professors are in
Heidelberg
*
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Hyeroglyph-writing,
in the decipherment of which little progress has been made
*
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I am
writing you hieroglyphs; I shall hardly be able to decipher them
*
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So for
every four letters you have 4x6 or 4.3.2 permutations… and in general for
n letters (factorial n) permutations…
*
Total of
numbers in each combination … 2, 6, 12, 20, 30, 42
*
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(A
Heidelberg
notebook contains permutations written out in four groups of six;
calculations of factorial 60; and multiplications of successive integers by
2, 6, 12, 20, 30 and 42)
*
|
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Draw lines
for music-notes round in a circle |
(In a
friend's album - the ABEGG theme written out on a stave drawn round in a
circle) |
The critic (1831-44)
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The
old Cabbalists are said to be the inventors of this method:
*
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Gade’s
name can be spelt with four clefs and one note, in a way which
Cabbalists can easily find out:
*
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…the art
of so arranging a basket of flowers that their order expresses a whole
sequence of ideas, see Section IV (about the language of flowers) ...
(Similarly) one can speak to the initiated by means of musical tones…
(eg) at an
Institute for the Blind ... words were written in any language, translated
into notes, and played ... a similar boon for the deaf
*
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A present
of two or three flowers often says more than a whole basket of them
*
A musical
language of flowers was one of my earliest ideas
*
(Some)
music is itself a language, rather as flowers speak to us
*
(Perhaps)
the scent of a flower is to the deaf as the sound of music is to the blind.
The language to be translated here
*
|
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(The
meaning of wreaths) poppy-flower, night ... night-violet, evening
*
narcissus,
I, me
|
I would
make (John Field) a wreath of poppy-flowers and evening violets, for he is
the darling of the twilight hours
*
The
narcissus says, think of me
|
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The lover (1831-40)
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myrtles, marrying...(a gift of myrtles means I want to marry you)
*
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Myrthen (op 25) is to be a wedding present ... to my beloved bride
*
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The main
use of this dumb language is for secret affairs... In it a girl receives and
replies to her first declaration of love. From her gestures the lucky lover
can tell the day, the time, and the place where he can find his beloved
*
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Eyes can
exchange the most secret of stories
*
As I was
playing the declaration of love, in she came; guardian spirit, bring me
close to her soon
*
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(Some
believe) that two people can establish a secret rapport such that they can
exchange secrets though far apart
*
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Tomorrow
morning at 11 0' clock I shall be
playing the Adagio and thinking of you ... do the same, so that we may meet
in spirit. The place will be where our ghostly doubles met
*
as kindred
spirits can meet though miles away
*
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… weave the
words of a secret message one by one through the text of what is ostensibly
an ordinary letter ... this is then continued in a codicil or postscript,
which contains the agreed key
*
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Dear
Clara. You must read the end first (which is) a sort of lexicon of
illegibly-written words. Thus the letter can become very striking and
piquant
*
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Beda (ie
the Venerable Bede) wrote a treatise on expression by gestures of the
fingers ...
*
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Beda (ie
Clara) sat at the piano to show me (ie by her playing) the picture of
her beloved
*
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Garrick
was also famed (for the eloquence of
his gestures)
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(John
Field) like Garrick declaiming can so express the simplest musical ABC that
it makes one feel sad |
The psychotic (1854)
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Invisibile or so-called sympathetic writing ... written between the lines …
later the letters stand out |
But I
have often written to you with sympathetic ink, and between these lines
there is secret writing, which will later stand out |
There are many
other detailed correspondences
including several between the cipher-system first inferred from Schumann's music
and later found in Klüber's book, making nearly 50 points in all. Not all have
equal force; but many are striking. Even so, each could no doubt be explained
singly as coincidence. But can they collectively be so explained?
lf not, then
Schumann not only knew Klüber's book,
but knew it well. He presumably had a copy in his possession for over 25 years.
Its images and ideas can be seen simmering on or near the surface of his prose
throughout his life; secrets, keys, letters, alphabets, lexicons, mysteries,
veils, initiations, all in thrall to the arcane and inexplicable power of music.
Schumann habitually described musical composition in general, and his own in
particular, as if it were a
special and strange form of written or uttered communication.
As Klüber says, a code - or cipher - system for that purpose may be constructed
from any signs capable of conveying a hidden meaning, whether numbers, letters,
chemical or mathematical symbols, or notes of music.
Ex hypothesi, Schumann would have read that book in the very year in which he began
to write music in earnest. Perhaps it served as a primer in every sense?
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