Pièce 139 - Postcard from Donald Tovey to R. C. Trevelyan

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Postmarked Staines; addressed to Trevelyan at the Shiffolds and forwarded to 8 Grosvenor Crescent, London SW. - Has been 'rather stuck' in both his work and his travels; waited in vain for better news of the Irish strike and ended up having 'three very jolly days' in Paris with [Pablo] Casals. One of Casals' friends,'a dear little old German Jew who tries to disentangle his travels for him', thinks that Ariadne [in "The Bride of Dionysus"] is 'the most ideal creature' ever to appear in opera, and has fallen in love with her. Has finished scoring the second act and is 'struggling with Phaedra'. Has to go slowly, as is finding himself easily tired; luckily he has a lot of practising to do which is 'a great relief to one's head'. Has reduced the fight with the Minotaur by twenty bars. Calls scoring 'a messy business', and blames the 'mid-nineteenth century academicians' for not learning from composers they disliked so that Tovey has to read 'all the Beastlioz & Fiszt' they ignored. Cannot get what he wants from contemporaries, as they 'don't write practically' like Berlioz and Liszt.