{"id":2869,"date":"2016-09-07T14:39:37","date_gmt":"2016-09-07T18:39:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/?p=2869"},"modified":"2017-04-02T07:55:34","modified_gmt":"2017-04-02T11:55:34","slug":"thomas-carlyle-the-carlyle-letters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/?p=2869","title":{"rendered":"Thomas Carlyle, The Carlyle Letters Online<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n
\n
Performer Name:<\/dt>\n
Pistrucci; Lyser<\/dd>\n
Performance Venue:<\/dt>\n
London<\/dd>\n
Performance Date:<\/dt>\n
 <\/dd>\n
Author:<\/dt>\n
Carlyle, Thomas<\/dd>\n
Date Written:<\/dt>\n
1836; 1844<\/dd>\n
Language:<\/dt>\n
English<\/dd>\n
Publication Title:<\/dt>\n
The Carlyle Letters Online<\/dd>\n
Article Title:<\/dt>\n
 <\/dd>\n
Page Numbers:<\/dt>\n
8:355-62; 18:188-89<\/dd>\n
Additional Info:<\/dt>\n
Ed. Brent E. Kinser. Precise pagination unavailable in online edition, found at www.carlyleletters.org<\/dd>\n
Publisher:<\/dt>\n
Duke University Press<\/dd>\n
Place of Publication:<\/dt>\n
 <\/dd>\n
Date Published:<\/dt>\n
2007-2016<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

Text:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

[Letter to John Carlyle, dated 25 June 1836:] Since that (some one else, perhaps one of the Frenchmen, giving me a Ticket) I went to hear an Italian Improvisatore<\/i>! He is called Pestrucci;* a Roman, but in bad odour there, owing to his Carbonarism and Friendship-for-Humanity. A man of sixty; with a thin wooden face (of the type of your Engraver\u2019s) and nose with a middle-cartilage<\/i> (do you know that particular turn of the nostrils\u2014expressive of ineffectual audacity, and toil that has not profited?) — a tuft of grey hair as if flung<\/i> upon the scalp of him; long stalking legs, small body; grey, simple-vehement eyes: this is our Pestrucci. He strode and stalked, raked anxiously his fingers thro\u2019 the grey tuft, clasped his temples, sprawled, and got clear with sweat and stew; chaunting in the Cantofermo<\/i> fashion (really not unlike old Lizzy Herd** reading the Scripture); and produced — the day of small things.*** I understood the most of it; — enough of it: but was interested in the poor old lean man chaunting and wriggling for a livelihood there, far from home.<\/p>\n

* Filippo Pistrucci, artist and Improvisatore, brother of Benedetto Pistrucci, medalist to the Mint, and father of Scipione (ca. 1814\u201354), friend and collaborator of Mazzini. He become secretary and then director of Mazzini\u2019s Free Italian School, founded 1841, at 5 Greville Street. Author of Iconology<\/i> (London, 1824), Manfredi<\/i> (London, 1834) and other works. Carlyle possibly attended an earlier, untraced performance, but the Times<\/i> (24 June) refers to his \u201cwell-known gift in improvisation\u201d at a concert in Hanover Square Rooms, 23 June.
\n** Possibly a member of one of the churches attended by the Carlyle family.
\n*** Cf. Zech. 4:10.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

[Letter to John Carlyle, dated 21 August, 1844:] The other night we had a singular little German Improvisatress here; one Madam Lyser from Dresden, who had<\/i> once had a Note for me from Goethe\u2019s Daughter-in-law,* but was now introduced by B\u00f6lte. She is a little black-eyed, angular-visaged, wise, curious little Sibyl of a body, this Lyser; totally unacquainted with English: we wished you had been here with your German. Neither Darwin nor I could make any hand of speaking; but she is quick as a little witch. We gave her 14 end-rhymes, and in an inconceivably brief time (really not half a minute, I think, by the watch) she had a most respectable little Sonnet crystallized upon them! I have seen nothing come near it in the improvising line, — a curious, but alas a barren one. She is to have Sitzung<\/i> at the Hanover Rooms tomorrow; but we apprehend it will hardly pay the room-rent, so totally empty is the season, so ignorant she of all the advertising and other London ways.**<\/p>\n

* Mme. Lyser not further identified. Ottilie von Goethe (1796\u20131872); see TC to G, 17 Jan. 1828.
\n** No advert. or review has been traced. The Hanover Rooms, Hanover Sq., were used for recitals.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Notes:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\n
Collected by:<\/dt>\n
EW<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two excerpts from Thomas Carlyle’s letters which mention improvisatori: in the first, he mentions a performance by Pistrucci, an Italian, and in the second he recounts seeing a performance by Madam Lyser from Germany. Both are treated as strange (and rather naive) foreign curiosities. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,134],"tags":[112,211,66],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2869"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2869"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2869\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3526,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2869\/revisions\/3526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/romanticimprov.utoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}