I WAS BORN ON THE STROKE OF TWELVE, BETWEEN THE 30TH AND 31ST OF JULY, 1751. TO SOME I AM THE FOREMOST KEYBOARD PLAYER IN EUROPE BUT TO OTHERS, I AM THE OVERLOOKED SISTER OF A GENIUS. THE MATTER IS COMPLICATED. I WRITE MUSIC FOR THE BOTTOM DRAWER WHILE LIVING IN SALZBURG WITH MY DEAR MAMA. PAPA IS IN ROME WITH WOLFIE TO ENSHRINE MY BROTHER'S TALENTS AND IN THE YEAR, 1770, I AM DESTINED FOR MARRIAGE, NOT A CAREER.
MARIA ANNA WALBURGA IGNATIA MOZART - NANNERL FOR SHORT
Mozart’s Sister - Blog
This fictional blog/diary develops characters from A. M. Bauld’s novel Mozart’s Sister first written by the author in 2005 and published by Alcina Press.
The first two entries read as follows. Click on the heading above to go to the full blog and to see all entries.
Franz Xaver Mozart
Franz Xaver - my brother's younger son and my nephew, has paid a visit. He is a composer in Lemburg but I have not heard any of his compositions. Reminds me of Jack Pudding – the way he talks -very fast - the shape of HIS forehead - wide - HIS gestures - restless - and HIS scent - a faint musk that remains when he has gone. We talk in waves. He insists he has learnt more about his father from his old auntie than from anyone he has known before, including his mother whose apartment I can see inside my head. I ask him to visit my son, Leopold in Innsbruck before he returns to Lemburg – I tell him they are more like brothers than cousins. Feel very close to this fine young man and share his sense of melancholy.
30th July 1829
My last Will and Testament while I can still think and speak:
I give Mama’s two jeweled rings to my nephews, Karl Thomas and Franz Xaver Mozart. What rights that I retain to my brother’s Requiem shall also be transferred to them. All other monies and worldly goods I bequeath in their entirety to my son, Leopold Berchtold zu Sonnenburg.
It is true that except in the matter of this diary, I have been an exile from what has gone before. I am sometimes gripped by a pattern of lights, a glittering aura that I cannot blink away. Just as it persists, without any intention on my part, it will suddenly cease to be and what I perceive in its aftermath appears fainter, until I can only imagine the shadows in front of me, for I cannot see.
It lasts - this aura- no more than six or seven seconds or the experience would be more than spirits could bear. Perhaps it is a moment of dying, a pleasurable signal and not a thing of fear that I am returning to the place from where I came, an instant of reckoning where I feel compelled to recapture what is past without a quill. I am quite tired.
Franz Xaver has brought some visitors - met English publisher, Vincent Novello and wife. They bring money from admirers in England. Good to be sister of genius.
Maria Anna Walburga Ignatia Mozart zu Sonnenburg
Maria Anna Mozart, c.1829.
Born 30 July 1751 in Salzburg, died 29 October 1829 (aged 78).
Other names Marianne, Nannerl.
Spouse: Johan Baptist Franz von Berchtold zu Sonnenburg (m. 1784).
Parents: Anna Maria Pertl, Leopold Mozart.