‘Variations’, and the ‘Friends pictured within’

Abstract

Abstract In approaching the zenith of Elgar’s creative life and the apogee of his national fame, it will be necessary to abandon strict chronological biographical methods and to follow his progress by means of the personal associations and early histories of some of the works, and by a closer study of his relationships with a growing circle of friends and acquaintances—and enemies. Despite his grumbling to Jaeger and his almost neurotic preoccupation with wider public and material recognition—though, as has been seen, he had in some respects a poor opinion of public taste—Elgar was fully aware that it was only in Worcestershire that he was able to work in the concentrated quiet that he needed. The peace and beauty of the countryside were as necessary a creative stimulant to him as they were to Beethoven, and he found them in full measure at the cottage, Birchwood, among the woods and within walking distance of the British Camp and all the other associations with Caractacus. Alice and he first stayed there on 16 May 1898. When he wrote to Jaeger during the summer of 1898, he would put ‘Birchwood (once more!)’ or ‘Birchwood (in peace)’ or ‘at Forli but just leaving for Birchwood Deo Gratias !’ at the head of his letters. But it was from ‘Forli’, when the woods were ‘decidedly damp and rheumaticky—unromantic just now’, that on 24 October 1898 he wrote to him: ‘Since I’ve been back [from a visit to London] I have sketched a set of Variations (orkestra) on an original theme: the Variations have amused me because I’ve labelled ‘em with the nicknames of my particular friends—you are Nimrod. That is to say I’ve written the variations each one to represent the mood of the “party”—I’ve liked to imagine the ‘party’ writing the var: him (or her) self and have written what I think they wd. have written—if they were asses enough to compose—it’s a quaint idea & the result is amusing to those behind the scenes & won’t affect the hearer who “nose nuffin”. What think you?’