The Life of Ludwig Van Beethoven

This authoritative biography of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 1827) was a landmark in its meticulous research and use of source material. For the American author Alexander Wheelock Thayer (1817 97), it represented a lifelong labour of love, yet it remained unfinished at his death. His friend Hermann Deiters (1833 1907) edited and translated Thayer's work into German, publishing three volumes which covered Beethoven's life to 1816. Since Deiters also died before the biography could be completed, musicologist Hugo Riemann (1849 1919) was called upon to conclude the work. The final German volumes appeared in 1907 and 1908. It was the American critic Henry Edward Krehbiel (1854 1923) who prepared the present work, the first and considerably revised English version, published in three volumes in 1921. Volume 3 covers Beethoven's final years, his ninth symphony and late quartets."