Richard Strauss, "Fanfare für die Wiener Philharmoniker, Op. 109"

Richard Strauss, "Also Sprach Zarathustra"

I. Introduction

II. Of the Backworldsmen

Once on a time, Zarathustra also cast his fancy beyond man, like all backworldsmen. The work of a suffering and tortured God, did the world then seem to me.

The dream—and diction—of a God, did the world then seem to me; coloured vapours before the eyes of a divinely dissatisfied one.

Good and evil, and joy and woe, and I and thou—coloured vapours did they seem to me before creative eyes. The creator wished to look away from himself,—thereupon he created the world [...]

III. Of the Great Longing

O my soul, I have taught thee to say "to-day" as "once on a time" and "formerly," and to dance thy measure over every Here and There and Yonder.

O my soul, I delivered thee from all by-places, I brushed down from thee dust and spiders and twilight.

O my soul, I washed the petty shame and the by-place virtue from thee, and persuaded thee to stand naked before the eyes of the sun.

With the storm that is called "spirit" did I blow over thy surging sea; all clouds did I blow away from it; I strangled even the strangler called "sin." [...]

IV. Of Joys and Passions

My brother, when thou hast a virtue, and it is thine own virtue, thou hast it in common with no one.

To be sure, thou wouldst call it by name and caress it; thou wouldst pull its ears and amuse thyself with it.

And lo! Then hast thou its name in common with the people, and hast become one of the people and the herd with thy virtue!

Better for thee to say: "Ineffable is it, and nameless, that which is pain and sweetness to my soul, and also the hunger of my bowels."

Let thy virtue be too high for the familiarity of names, and if thou must speak of it, be not ashamed to stammer about it [...]

V. The Song of the Grave

"Yonder is the grave-island, the silent isle; yonder also are the graves of my youth. Thither will I carry an evergreen wreath of life."

Resolving thus in my heart, did I sail o'er the sea.—

Oh, ye sights and scenes of my youth! Oh, all ye gleams of love, ye divine fleeting gleams! How could ye perish so soon for me! I think of you to-day as my dead ones.

From you, my dearest dead ones, cometh unto me a sweet savour, heart-opening and melting. Verily, it convulseth and openeth the heart of the lone seafarer.

Still am I the richest and most to be envied—I, the lonesomest one! For I HAVE POSSESSED you, and ye possess me still. Tell me: to whom hath there ever fallen such rosy apples from the tree as have fallen unto me?

Still am I your love's heir and heritage, blooming to your memory with many-hued, wild-growing virtues, O ye dearest ones! [...]

VI. Of Science and Learning

Thus sang the magician; and all who were present went like birds unawares into the net of his artful and melancholy voluptuousness. Only the spiritually conscientious one had not been caught: he at once snatched the harp from the magician and called out: "Air! Let in good air! Let in Zarathustra! Thou makest this cave sultry and poisonous, thou bad old magician!

Thou seducest, thou false one, thou subtle one, to unknown desires and deserts. And alas, that such as thou should talk and make ado about the TRUTH!

Alas, to all free spirits who are not on their guard against SUCH magicians! It is all over with their freedom: thou teachest and temptest back into prisons,—

—Thou old melancholy devil, out of thy lament soundeth a lurement: thou resemblest those who with their praise of chastity secretly invite to voluptuousness!" [...]

VII. The Convalescent

One morning, not long after his return to his cave, Zarathustra sprang up from his couch like a madman, crying with a frightful voice, and acting as if some one still lay on the couch who did not wish to rise. Zarathustra's voice also resounded in such a manner that his animals came to him frightened, and out of all the neighbouring caves and lurking-places all the creatures slipped away—flying, fluttering, creeping or leaping, according to their variety of foot or wing. Zarathustra, however, spake these words:

Up, abysmal thought out of my depth! I am thy cock and morning dawn, thou overslept reptile: Up! Up! My voice shall soon crow thee awake!

Unbind the fetters of thine ears: listen! For I wish to hear thee! Up! Up! There is thunder enough to make the very graves listen!

And rub the sleep and all the dimness and blindness out of thine eyes! Hear me also with thine eyes: my voice is a medicine even for those born blind.

And once thou art awake, then shalt thou ever remain awake. It is not MY custom to awake great-grandmothers out of their sleep that I may bid them—sleep on! [...]

VIII. The Dance-Song

One evening went Zarathustra and his disciples through the forest; and when he sought for a well, lo, he lighted upon a green meadow peacefully surrounded with trees and bushes, where maidens were dancing together. As soon as the maidens recognised Zarathustra, they ceased dancing; Zarathustra, however, approached them with friendly mien and spake these words:

Cease not your dancing, ye lovely maidens! No game-spoiler hath come to you with evil eye, no enemy of maidens.

God's advocate am I with the devil: he, however, is the spirit of gravity. How could I, ye light-footed ones, be hostile to divine dances? Or to maidens' feet with fine ankles?

To be sure, I am a forest, and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid of my darkness, will find banks full of roses under my cypresses.

And even the little God may he find, who is dearest to maidens: beside the well lieth he quietly, with closed eyes [...]

IX. Song of the Night Wanderer

Then, when it was about midnight, Zarathustra went his way over the ridge of the isle, that he might arrive early in the morning at the other coast; because there he meant to embark. For there was a good roadstead there, in which foreign ships also liked to anchor: those ships took many people with them, who wished to cross over from the Happy Isles. So when Zarathustra thus ascended the mountain, he thought on the way of his many solitary wanderings from youth onwards, and how many mountains and ridges and summits he had already climbed.

I am a wanderer and mountain-climber, said he to his heart, I love not the plains, and it seemeth I cannot long sit still.

And whatever may still overtake me as fate and experience—a wandering will be therein, and a mountain-climbing: in the end one experienceth only oneself.

The time is now past when accidents could befall me; and what COULD now fall to my lot which would not already be mine own! [...]

"boring conversation anyway - Dimitri, we're going to have company!"

JoDru's post made me think about how it's no surprise that John Williams is very much the "big-orchestra jock." I'm sure I'm not the only person to hear Strauss, Mahler, and Stravinsky's Rite in the music of John Williams.

So much so, in fact, that sometimes I swear I remember Debussy's nymphs or Stravinsky's ballet dancers making an appearance in one of the earlier versions of Lucas's redos of the original trillogy.

I'm pretty sure Cocteau convinced Lucas to CG in some shots of Vaslav Nijinsky bickering with one of the Jawas. I saw it in one of the rereleased dvds.

Anyway, the recent post made glaringly obvious to me Williams's ode to Shostakovich. It is so natural now, especially in regard to the Eisenstein connections.

According to the director's commentary on this same dvd, the name of the big Star Destroyer command ship that Vader rode on was "Potemkin."

Shotakovich - Symphony for Strings, Op. 110a-Allegro Molto (attacca)
Shostakovich - Symphony for Strings op 110a Largo






jodru:
Boy, does that ever beggar a post! But first, the movie...