Schoenberg
- This is a preview of the essay.
To view the full text you must login!
Schnberg's relationship with his wife created a personal crisis in the year 1909. After becoming close friends with expressionistic painter Richard Gerstl, Schnberg, his family and friends invited Gerstl on a summer vacation with them. This friendship blossomed and Gerstl even gave Schnberg painting lessons. Gerstl even painted several marvelous paintings of the Schnberg family before eventually running off and eloping with Mathilde. Mathilde eventually went back to Arnold after he threatened to commit suicide. Needless to say, Gerstl was devastated by Mathilde's parting and in turn hung himself. It was through the event of his wife leaving him that some of his more profound works were created especially Die Glchliche Hand and Erwartung
It is in Schnberg's representation of Erwartung that we gain some insight to the troubles that he was going through. In the summer of 1909, Schnberg commissioned a libretto from Marie Pappenheim with instructions to be a "representation of the psychological states of a woman in love." Marie Pappenheim, the librettist, was a young medical student who wrote poetry. Interestingly enough, Marie Pappenheim was related to Bertha Pappenheim, who was "Anna O" from Freud and Breuer's Psychoanalytic Case-Study (http://www...