By Mehru Jaffer

The river Danube is a little further away from where I live in Vienna. The thirst therefore for the sound of water has to be quenched by racing down to the lazy rivulet just round the corner. And this is no ordinary corner but that lap of the Vienna woods where Beethoven composed the magical Pastoral Symphony in the early 19th century.
I am told that the air around the place has not changed much from the times of Beethoven. And leaning in the midst of the woods against a tall memorial to the short, stout man with a very red face, small, intense eyes and bushy eyebrows I think of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. The Indian prime minister’s yearning to contribute to a lasting peace on the subcontinent reminds me of Beethoven who had once wandered in the woods hoping that in the winter of existence, “When I shall be grey and sated with life, I desire for myself the good fortune that my repose be as honourable and beneficent as the repose of nature in the winter time.’
This is the surrounding where Beethoven was forced to fight some of the most severe battles of his life. As he kept an eye on Napoleon, the master military man and his glowing performance on the battle field, the artist and musician was enthralled but engaged in struggles of his own soul. Thinking that his dream of a lasting peace in Europe was about to be realised with the victories brought home by Napoleon he dedicated a symphony to the General and wrote Fidelio, the opera based on the ideals of the French Revolution. For Beethoven had looked upon Napoleon as a hero of the common man. And once the manuscript was finished he signed it in great flourish in a mixture of all the languages at his command including Italian, French and German.
“Grand Symphony entitled Bonaparte, written by Signor Louis van Beethoven in August, 1803, for Buonaparte. Symphony No.3,Op.55,“ he wrote. The overjoyed musician who was quite sure that the future of mankind was superior to the interest of nations and who looked upon war as a barbaric violence was about to send the autographed manuscript titled Buonaparte to his publishers when news was brought to him that Napoleon had crowned himself emperor of France.
According to Ferdinand Ries, a student and biographer Beethoven who was already famous for his short temper flew into a fury. He screamed, “Is he, too, nothing more than an ordirnay human being? Now he will trample on all the rights of man and indulge only his ambition. He will exalt himself above all others and become a tyrant!’
Saying all this and much more he ran to his table on which the innocent manuscript lay and crossed out the word Buonaparte with such passion that the paper tore and some say, bled. When the symphony was finally published in October, 1806, it was no longer dedicated to Napoleon but became famous as the Sinfonia Eroica or the Heroic Symphony, in memory of a hero. After that Beethoven could never speak of Napoleon without sounding like a raging storm backed by sounds like terrible thunder and lightening.
When he was told that Napoleon was dead in 1821 and asked if was waiting to make music for the ocassion he composed the second movement of the Eroica Symphony, a revolutionary funeral march that mocked the sounds of the solemn brass drum roles and defeaning musket volleys that were part of military funeral of the times.
Beethoven’s disappointment in Napoleon is seen as an artistic journey from light into darkness and his continuing search for spiritual solutions for all of humanity, as back into the light. For when hope goes into hiding it is easy to rediscover it in Beethoven’s finale to the Ninth Symphony that he composed later.
And ever since Vajpayee has announced his resolve to step out from his own darkness that is the only music that I have been listening to.