Footnotes

¹ Schenker was at his mother’s place on January 11 (diary), before she received Moriz Schenker’s letter, OJ 14/5. [2], January 10, 1914, in which he informed her that he is sending her 200 Kronen, and that this will occur monthly from now on. Schenker saw the present letter when he visited her again on January 15. His reaction is worth quoting in full: “With Mama; [...] She shows me a letter from Mošio, in which 200 Kronen were enclosed. In the letter, my brother explains that from now on he wants to send 200 Kronen monthly. But how can my brother's behavior be explained? Was it the purely sober consideration, under the pressure of a lawyer's letter [Max Gross, OJ 11/26, [5], to Moriz Schenker], that he could eventually hold a still greater attainment? That is hardly imaginable, since he would have had to pay only 100 Kronen at his mother's own request and the express observation of the lawyer! Thus I assume, on the contrary, that either the impetuous letter of the lawyer made our mother's situation seem very perilous to him, so that he, as he believed, did not wish to sour the very last part of our mother's life with further knavery; or that he, in fantastical outburst and with regard to a passage in the lawyer's letter, wished to take over the payment from me myself! But be that as it may – it remains gratifying that he is at least giving our mother the satisfaction of material kindnesses, as he also held out the prospect of a visit to her on the 1st of March!”.

² Mazzes: plural of Mazze, i.e. matzoh (unleavened bread). Mazzes-Insel was an informal name for the Jewish quarter of Vienna, roughly the 2nd district, Leopoldstadt. Usage of the word here could perhaps refer to relatives or friends living in that quarter.

Commentary

Format

1p letter, holograph salutation, message, valediction, and signature

Provenance

Schenker, Heinrich (document date-1935)--Schenker, Jeanette (1935-c.1942)--Ratz, Erwin (c.1942-c.1945)--Jonas, Oswald (c.1945-1978)--University of California, Riverside (1978--)

Rights Holder

Heirs of Julia Schenker or Moriz Schenker, respectively, deemed to be in the public domain

License

This document is deemed to be in the public domain. Any claim to intellectual rights on this document should be addressed to the Schenker Correspondence Project, Faculty of Music, University of Cambridge, at schenkercorrespondence [at] mus (dot) cam (dot) ac (dot) uk.

Digital version created: 2024-02-09
Last updated: 2010-03-21