Glenn Gould: A Life and Variations by Otto Friedrich (review)

204 LETI'ERS IN CANADA 1989 Otto Friedrich. Glenn Gould: A Life and Variations Lester and Orpen Dennys. xviii, 441. $27.95 On the surface, Otto Friedrich's biography of Gould is a detailed and sympathetic account of one of this century's great musical figures. It traces and analyses the artist's many activities - the Variations of the subtitle- from the prodigy and concert pianist who gave up concertizing in his thirties (like Liszt), to the sometime composer, the lecturer about Schoenberg, the writer exploring the relationship of art and technology, the innovative recording musician, the experimenter with radio and TV documentaries, the genius who died prematurely at fifty (like Mahler). The well-known episodes are recounted, such as the brush with Leonard Bernstein over the Brahms n-minor Concerto performance, as are little-known ones, such as Gould's police record as a reckless driver. Appendices itemize Gould's concerts, recordings, CBC radio and TV shows, and published writings. But underneath the description of Gould's life I sense two broader themes. One is the familiar question whether it is proper to write the biography of a celebrity who seemingly wanted to be known only by what he achieved and what he had to say. The other, a subsidiary to the first, is the problem ofseparating in Gould sincere conviction from game playing, objective validity from rationalization. What matters more: an artist's life or his artistry? Friedrich obviously regarded this question as a challenge, for he quotes three warnings to the would-be biographer at the head of his narrative. Thus Gould claims that 'The really important things in any biography are what someone thinks and feels and not what he has done,' while Geoffrey Payzant predicts that 'Perhaps the author of the second book on Glenn Gould will attempt a "conventional " biography. He will fail ... [Gould's] private life is in fact austere and unremarkable. A book on his life and timewould be brief and boring.' Let it be stated that Friedrich's fascination with Gould's psychology and earthly existence easily maintains the upper hand over the discussion of his musicianship, his visions and messages, in contradistinction to Payzant's 1978 study of Gould, subtitled Music and Mind. Is Friedrich's approach justified? Answers may be sought in turn from the writer, the reader, and the subject. Friedrich, a New York writer selected by the Gould Estate to write an 'official' biography, was given complete freedom to explore the Gould papers at the National Library of Canada and to interview dozens of people. His skill in interrelating outer events and inner characteristics, and in amassing detail without becoming pedantic and boring, goes a long way towards justifying the book as a piece of writing. It is to Friedrich's credit that he did not play professional psychiatrist (or music critic), but consulted medical authorities where this was helpful. HUMANITIES 205 In referring to the vast Beethoven literature, Ernest MacMillan aptly articulated the reader's point of view by speaking of 'the psychological complexitythat so delights the literary man.' Needless to say, generations of readers have been fascinated by the complexities of Liszt's life, or Einstein's, many of whom know little more than one of the Hungarian Rhapsodies and could never grasp Relativity. No doubt, Glenn Gould, like most other celebrities, would have objected to the public scrutiny of his psyche and his intimate life, especially when that scrutiny takes preference over the study of his musicianship and his messages. Had death not come so suddenly, he might have destroyed part of his personal papers. Gould felt that the burden of knowledge about a composition obstructs recognition of its intrinsic structural merits and yearned for 'a climate in which biographical data and chronological assumption can no longer be the cornerstone for judgements about art as it relates to the environment.' By extension one should judge the artist himself by his fruits, divorced from knowledge of their roots and their soil. Here the second subtheme enters. Self-effacement and desire for fame live closely together in many of us. As the narrative moves along, more and more evidence is revealed to show that Gould courted...