Essays Before a Sonata

es or attributes which go with personality cannot be suggested, and that artistic intuitions which parallel them cannot be reflected in mu

but a series of unpleasant sounds. How far can the composer be held accountable? Beyond a certain point the responsibility is more or less undeterminable. The outside characteristics-that is, the points furthest away from the mergings-are obvious to mostly anyone. A child knows a "strain of joy," from one of sorrow. Those a lit

and readily recognized. But maybe music was not intended to satisfy the curious definiteness of man. Maybe it is better to hope that music may always be a transcendental language in the most extravagant sense. Possibly the power of