num_pages: 304
description: Inspired by the famous composers notebooks this biographical novel offers a perfect portrait of an irascible genius and revelatory fossils of the last year of Beethovens anguished life (Edmund White)Deaf as he was Beethoven had to be addressed in writing and he was always accompanied by a notebook in which people could scribble questions and comments. In a tour de force fiction invention Conversations with Beethoven tells the story of the last year of Beethovens life almost entirely through such notebook entries. Friends family students doctors and others attend to the volatile Maestro whose sometimes unpredictable and often very loud replies we infer. A fully fleshed and often very funny portrait of Beethoven emerges. He struggles with his music and with his health; he argues with and insults just about everyone. Most of all he worries about his waywardand belovednephew Karl. A large cast of Dickensian characters surrounds the great composer at the center of this wonderfully engaging novel which deepens in the end to make a memorable music of its own.
language: English
title: Conversations with Beethoven
publisher: NYRB Classics