Death Masks

[Bill Barilko]

Originally Posted by dnleeson

The book to which Barilko refers is Lange's autobiography.

No it isn't. Would Lange refer to himself in the third person? It's vol. 14 of Constant von Wurzbach's Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich.

Until about a year ago, one could hardly find a copy of it. WORLDCAT listed only 8 libraries in the world that had it, and I was fortunate enough to be very near one of the libraries, namely Stanford University. Then googlebooks chose to issue the volume and one can now find it on Amazon.com.

Google Books already published Lange's autobiography in 2005.

But the book creates more questions than it gives answers. Much of the book speaks only of Lange's acting career with references to his performance of Romeo and Juliet and other Shakespere plays. I got the feeling that he thought of himself primarily as an actor and not as a painter.

Small wonder: he was an actor by profession.

There is also a serious gap in his history, and it cannot be by accident that there is nothing said. First there is no reference to the Lange portrait of Mozart, and that gives rise to a lot of questions about why not. While a portrait of Mozart (and unfinished too) would not have made a big bang in the late 1700s, its existence would have been important news by 1825 or so.

As Lange's silence on this topic proves, it wouldn't. The people who subscribed to Lange's book, were interested in Lange's career, not in unfinished portraits of Mozart.

Second, I could find only a single reference to Mozart. My notes say the reference is on page 171, but perhaps I missed some. It is not the easiest read.

Why not use Google Books ;)? Lange states that he doesn't want to write much about his brother in law, "because so much has already been written about the singularities of this great man."

The problem with Wurzbach telling us about Lange's continued interest in painting is that it is second hand information and uncorroborated.

Gosh, what do you know about Wurzbach's source? Have you checked Wurzbach's papers at the Wienbibliothek? That Lange liked to paint well into his old age was no secret and MANY of his paintings date from long after 1800. After all, how could he paint his three illegitimate daughters (all of whom were born after 1800), if he had stopped painting in 1788?

But then again, the stories about him stopping his painting activities are also second hand information, though there is some corroboration.

Such as?

What troubled me most about his autography is his failure to deal with Mozart more thoroughly.

Like many famous actors Lange was a thoroughly vain person (see Castelli on this). Why should he have distracted his admirers with stories about his estranged(!) wife's brother in law?

And I wondered (without any evidence at all) if this might have been due perhaps to Mozart and Lange's wife reestablishing the romantic relationship that went so badly earlier in their lives.

And because Aloysia Lange fumbled around with the love of her youth, she gave birth to Lange's children in 1788, 1790, and 1792. Now, wait a moment! Aloysia's last child must have been fathered by nobody else than Mozart! That's why the boy's name was Joseph, to not arouse Lange's suspicion! Maybe I should write one of these absurd Mozart books myself someday ;)