Stravinsky as a Russian

Extract

What can one say, with what words should one address Igor Feodorovich Stravinsky on his eighty-fifth birthday, a day for the greatest rejoicing both in his personal life and in his life as an artist? We must express infinite gratitude to him (but can it be expressed in words?), for it is essential that he should know that notwithstanding his world-wide recognition, he is, and always will be, both as a man and as a composer, one of the great mysteries of world culture, and in particular of Russian culture, a mystery that will live forever, that will always be subject to fresh interpretations and that will always be needed. His secret—which cannot really be explained—is first and foremost the secret of his genius, the mysterious unexpectedness and the marvel of his appearance in the music of Russia and the world. As Tolstoy said: “Genius is that which cannot be called anything else but genius!” Its basic characteristics, moreover, are unpredictability and self-evidence.