The presto is too wonderful for words. Rubinstein, or
was it originally Tausig who named it "Night winds sweeping over
the churchyard graves"? Its agitated, whirring, unharmonized
triplets are strangely disquieting, and can never be mistaken for
mere etude passage work. The movement is too sombre, its curves
too full of half-suppressed meanings, its rush and sub-human
growling too expressive of something that defies definition.
Schumann compares it to a "sphinx with a mocking smile." To Henri
Barbadette "C'est Lazare grattant de ses ongles la pierre de son
tombeau," or, like Mendelssohn, one may abhor it, yet it cannot
be ignored. It has Asiatic coloring, and to me seems like the
wavering outlines of light-tipped hills seen sharply en
silhouette, behind which rises and falls a faint, infernal glow.
This art paints as many differing pictures as there are
imaginations for its sonorous background; not alone the universal
solvent, as Henry James thinks, it bridges the vast, silent gulfs
between human souls with its humming eloquence. This sonata is
not dedicated.
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