What Beethoven Books Do You Own?

[Roehre]

I've got both the "massive format" H.C. Landon book and the "abridged" version - tho the abridged version is supposedly updated from the HC one? I know there's some new pictures in there at least.

So all of the scurrilous Schindler fabrications have been expunged from the Forbes-edited Thayer book? That was the main reason I haven't read it yet, since I thought the conversation book forgeries were not discovered until 1970?

The Cooper book I read in tandem with the Lewis Lockwood book and I much preferred the Cooper, tho the Lockwood has gotten higher recommendations from friends in academia. Cooper's Beethoven Compendium is also pretty great - superbly detailed chronology in there....

The "abridged" Robbins Landon has got only one "new" picture AFAIK, the "young" Beethoven (p.6 of the English version).
The Schindler fabrications in the conversation booklets were discovered in the early 1970s and fully assessed by 1977 (and made public during the East Berlin Beethoven conference that year), but these booklets were hardly accessible to Thayer(/Deiters/Reimann) and only the first couple of them to Forbes anyway. But in the 1960s strong doubts already existed regarding Schindler's reliability in general.

Cooper, Lockwood and the recent Solomon are the first English biographies which benefitted of the complete 11 volumes of the edition of the Konversationshefte (still not completely translated in English I'm afraid; a 12th volume, consisting of the loose folios and other -mostly hardly if at all to date- Beethoven conversations on scratches of paper is still in preparation, but most likely will not appear even before the next "anniversary" in 2020 ).

I hope the 2009 Craeyens biography (only in Flemish/Dutch at the moment) will be translated in English ASAP, as it shows another apprach to Beethoven and incorporates the newest insights as well as the latest editions of sources, like the Albrecht edition of correspondence TO Beethoven and the Henle Edition of contemporary information regarding Beethoven published during B's lifetime (Beethoven aus der Sicht seiner Zeitgenossen, 2009). He also had entrance to material for the still unpublished 8th volume of the Brandenburg Beethoven Briefe edition (re Beethoven documents)

[Michael]

The Cooper book I read in tandem with the Lewis Lockwood book and I much preferred the Cooper, tho the Lockwood has gotten higher recommendations from friends in academia. Cooper's Beethoven Compendium is also pretty great - superbly detailed chronology in there....

I had the Lockwood book in my hand a few days ago (in a real live bookshop)and was sorely tempted to buy it but I resisted. (The asking price had a lot to do with the decision.) I have the Cooper Compendium as well and it's a great reference source.

[The Dude]

With the US dollar in free-fall why don't you consider getting the book from Amazon USA?

[Michael]

With the US dollar in free-fall why don't you consider getting the book from Amazon USA?

Good idea. Although what Ed C has said above has put me off it a bit now. I doubt if it will tell me anything Barry Cooper hasn't. Has The Dude or anyone else read it?

[The Dude]

No, The Dude hasn't read it. Just seems like a good time to buy from the good old USA right now that's all.

[Ed C]

It's not a BAD book, the chapter on the Grosse Fuge had some interesting stuff. But it didn't flow chronologically like the Cooper book. With Cooper I felt like I was learning WITH LvB, with Lockwood, it was more like - "and now we get to his Stage Works...".

The other book that I think is probably good - maybe great - is the William Kinderman book, but I'm having trouble because it's IMHO the most technical of the ones mentioned so far recently .
Anyways, if you see the Lockwood for $15 or under it's probably worth it...

[Roehre]

The other book that I think is probably good - maybe great - is the William Kinderman book, but I'm having trouble because it's IMHO the most technical of the ones mentioned so far recently .

The Kinderman books (there is an excellent one on the Diabelli variations as well) are more technical than Solomon, Cooper and Lockwood (though Cooper's book on Beethoven's compositional methods is rather technical too), but are very good.

[Michael]

I mentioned this in a recent thread, but J W N Sullivan's "Beethoven - His Spiritual Development" is one of my favourite works. It is not a biography in the strictest sense - but it really delves into the music.
The word "spiritual" in the title might give the wrong impression. It has little to do with religion but it has some remarkable insights into B's "empire of the mind", without going overboard like Maynard Solomon.

http://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Spir.../dp/0394701003

[Ed C]

I mentioned this in a recent thread, but J W N Sullivan's "Beethoven - His Spiritual Development" is one of my favourite works.

Now this I've seen in used bookstores. Though I don't recall seeing it the last time I swung thru...I'll pick it up next time...thx!

[EternaLisa]

The word "spiritual" in the title might give the wrong impression. It has little to do with religion but it has some remarkable insights into B's "empire of the mind", without going overboard like Maynard Solomon.

I chewed the covers of this one at one time {{not too much though}} - was searching for something along these lines "into the mind" of L-never really found anything that came directly from B--so then I thought, "why this really necessary that I do this?" at which exact point of 'realizing', I dropped my 'search' -- lots of disheveled publications in my wake (but, yes it IS a nice little pocket-size - compared to all the fluffy overloadeds)

[Michael]

I chewed the covers of this one at one time {{not too much though}} - was searching for something along these lines "into the mind" of L-never really found anything that came directly from B--so then I thought, "why this really necessary that I do this?" at which exact point of 'realizing', I dropped my 'search' -- lots of disheveled publications in my wake (but, yes it IS a nice little pocket-size - compared to all the fluffy overloadeds)

Yes - it's quite a short book but the author packs a lot into it. I bought it second-hand about 30 years ago - a 1928 edition. Not a first edition, but only a year behind!

[Quijote]

I mentioned this in a recent thread, but J W N Sullivan's "Beethoven - His Spiritual Development" is one of my favourite works. It is not a biography in the strictest sense - but it really delves into the music.
The word "spiritual" in the title might give the wrong impression. It has little to do with religion but it has some remarkable insights into B's "empire of the mind", without going overboard like Maynard Solomon [...]

I have read this book, and I have to say that I found it delves into the music in no meaningful way whatsoever. There were far too many words, I'm afraid, for such a slim tome.

[Quijote]

It's curious, but Francis Donald Tovey and J W Sullivan were writing about Beethoven at roughtly the same time, if I am not mistaken. I always found Tovey had interesting things to say about Beethoven, and Sullivan not.