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Diary entry by Schenker January 31, 1913

31.

Bei Dr. Harpner. Zugegen Rosenthal, Gärtner, Stöhr, Titel, 1 Schiff, 2 u. s. f. Frau Gärtner bringt spontan meinen Brief aufs Tapet u. beteuert, daß ich ihr damit Unrecht getan hätte; sie billige u. s. f. Gärtner teilt mir mit, daß ihm aus verläßlichster Quelle die besondere Wertschätzung meiner Leistungen von Seiten Riemann’s bekannt geworden ist. Welcher Gegensatz! – die Wahrheit der Mitteilung vorausgesetzt – zur Haltung Guido Adler’s, der die Würde eines Seminar-Instituts verletzend einen einfachen Schimpf schon für einen Beweis hält! Indessen fällt im letzteren Fall die Schande auf den Urheber zurück. —

*

© Transcription Marko Deisinger.
31.

At Dr. Harpner’s. Present were Rosenthal, Gärtner, Stöhr, Titel, 1 Schiff, 2 and others. Mrs. Gärtner spontaneously mentions my letter, and asserts that I thereby had done her a wrong; she supports her stance, etc. Gärtner informs me that, according to a most reliable source, the appreciation of my accomplishments on the part of Riemann has become acknowledged. What a contrast! – assuming that the communication is true – with the attitude of Guido Adler, who damages the dignity of a Seminar Institute by taking a simple rumor already for proof! Meanwhile, in the last instance the disgrace finds its way back to the originator. —

*

© Translation William Drabkin.
31.

Bei Dr. Harpner. Zugegen Rosenthal, Gärtner, Stöhr, Titel, 1 Schiff, 2 u. s. f. Frau Gärtner bringt spontan meinen Brief aufs Tapet u. beteuert, daß ich ihr damit Unrecht getan hätte; sie billige u. s. f. Gärtner teilt mir mit, daß ihm aus verläßlichster Quelle die besondere Wertschätzung meiner Leistungen von Seiten Riemann’s bekannt geworden ist. Welcher Gegensatz! – die Wahrheit der Mitteilung vorausgesetzt – zur Haltung Guido Adler’s, der die Würde eines Seminar-Instituts verletzend einen einfachen Schimpf schon für einen Beweis hält! Indessen fällt im letzteren Fall die Schande auf den Urheber zurück. —

*

© Transcription Marko Deisinger.
31.

At Dr. Harpner’s. Present were Rosenthal, Gärtner, Stöhr, Titel, 1 Schiff, 2 and others. Mrs. Gärtner spontaneously mentions my letter, and asserts that I thereby had done her a wrong; she supports her stance, etc. Gärtner informs me that, according to a most reliable source, the appreciation of my accomplishments on the part of Riemann has become acknowledged. What a contrast! – assuming that the communication is true – with the attitude of Guido Adler, who damages the dignity of a Seminar Institute by taking a simple rumor already for proof! Meanwhile, in the last instance the disgrace finds its way back to the originator. —

*

© Translation William Drabkin.

Footnotes

1 Presumably the Austrian conductor and composer Bernhard Tittel (1873–1942), who was conductor at the Vienna People’s Opera (Volksoper) in 1912.

2 In a diary entry of December 29, 1912, Schenker mentions "Prof. Schiff", possibly the Austrian sociologist, statistician, economist and expert in constitutional law Walter Schiff (1866–1950), who was appointed Professor of Political Economy at the University of Vienna in 1910, and was also active in public education Vienna. He was a cofounder of the Volksheim Ottakring and the private Girls’ Grammar School for the Further Education of Women, Vienna. His brother, Arthur Schiff (1871–1953), was a university lecturer for internal medicine and a well-known amateur violinist. Their father was the businessman Max Schiff (1829–1903), who was among the founders of the Vienna Music Society. See Johannes Feichtinger, Wissenschaft zwischen den Kulturen: österreichische Hochschullehrer in der Emigration 1933–1945 (Frankfurt and New York: Campus, 2001), pp. 168–69.