Amadeus Is a play which portrays the rivalry between Antonio Saltier. A famous composer, and Amadeus (Mozart). Saltier being jealous for Mozart talent declares war to God promising to destroy Mozart, his preferred creature, as he feels betrayed by God. Even though saline achieved what he wished most, fame; he felt that this was also his punishment, When had been rubbed In fame to vomiting, It would be taken away from him and Mozart music would sound louder and louder through the world, so as to win his battle with God, he tried to convince the world that he poisoned Mozart, to be remembered for infamy at least.
Retelling Act 1 Antonio Saltier a famous composer, being an old man, is sat in a wheelchair with his back to the audience. Feeling guilty cries out: “Mozart! Pardon your assassin… Have mercy. ” The Venezuela explain that when Mozart died thirty-two years ago, there was some talk about him being poisoned by Saltier. They wonder why Saltier would do such a thing and why he would confess it now. Saltier asks the audience to be his confessors. He admits his lifelong desire for fame, “yet only In one especial way. Musical Absolute music… Music Is God’s art”.
He longed “to Join all the composers who ad celebrated his glory through the long Italian past. ” As a result, he implored God, “let me be a composer… In return, I will live with virtue… And I will honor you with much music all the days of my life”. God answered to him “Go forth, Antonio. Serve Me and mankind, and you will be blessed”, Saltier thanked him and promised, “l am your servant for life”. The very next day, a family friend suddenly appeared and took him to Vienna, where he studied music and soon became the court composer.
Saltier decided, “Clearly my bargain had been accepted”. The same year the young prodigy Mozart was touring Europe. Sellers tells the audience, “l present to you, for one performance only, my last composition, entitled The Death of Mozart, or, Did I Do It? Dedicated to posterity on this, the last night of my life. ” He then takes off his dressing gown and becomes a young man wearing the elegant clothes of a successful composer In the sass. The scene shifts to 1781 age of Emperor Joseph II and his court in Vienna.
Saltier is thirty-one, “a prolific” composer to the Hapsburg court, and married to “a respectable” wife, Teresa. The ventricles, Galleries “Little Winds”, announce that Mozart will be giving a concert for the court. While Saltier sits in a chair eating sweets In the library at the Palace of EchoГ¶unborn, Constance Weber, daughter of Mozart landlady, runs Into the room squeaking like a mouse. Mozart follows her mewing like a cat. Mozart teases Constance (Stanza) with sexual innuendoes and bathroom humor and frequently emits an unforgettable giggle, piercing and Infantile.
HIS demeanor appeals Saltier. Later, when Mozart begins playing one of his compositions, Saltier responds with such delight that It makes him tremble. He runs out into the street and says “gasping for life” Addressing the audience he explains, “it seemed to me that I had heard a voice of God. And it was I OFF prays to God, asking Him, “let Your voice enter me! ” When his “Little Winds” report that audiences seem unimpressed by Mozart performances, Saltier begins to think that the serenade he heard was an exception, an accident.
Saltier composes an “extremely banal” march in Mozart honor. When Mozart quickly transforms it into an exceptional piece of music, Saltier admits, “was it then, so early, that I began to have thoughts of murder” Mozart clashes with the emperor’s advisors over his choice of subject and music for his commissioned operas. He also has difficulty finding pupils. Against the wishes of his father, he and Constance marry and the two live well beyond their means. When Constance asks Saltier to help her husband get work, the composer sees this as an opportunity to take his revenge.
He invites her to his apartment, where he plans to seduce her. After Saltier makes it clear that he will help Mozart if she grants him sexual favors, she at first resists, but soon starts to tease him. Saltier then throws her out, offended by her commonness and angry at his own considered descent into adultery and blackmail. When Saltier studies the manuscripts Constance left behind, he hears the music in his head, acknowledging that they are the same sounds he had heard at the palace, “the same crushed harmonies, glancing collisions, agonizing delights”.
The piece he had heard had been no accident. He admits, “l was staring through the cage of those meticulous ink strokes at-?an Absolute Beauty’. As a result, he feels betrayed by God:”‘ know my fate. Now for the first time I feel my emptiness as Adam felt his nakedness…. You gave me the desire to serve you… Then saw to it the service was shameful in the ears of the server…. You gave me the desire to praise you… Hen made me mute…. You put into me perception of the incomparable… Then ensured that I would know myself forever mediocre…. MOZART!… Pitiful, gingering, conceited, infantile Mozart… Him you have chosen to be your sole conduct. ” A bitter Saltier warns God, “From this time we are enemies, you and l. I’ll not accept it from you, do you hear?… You are the Enemy. I name Thee now… And this I swear: to my last breath I shall block you on earth, as far as I am able. ” The scene shifts to the present, with the older Saltier promising to reveal to the audience the details of the war he fought with God wrought his preferred Creature, Mozart, in the waging of which, of course, the Creature had to be destroyed.
Act 2 Back in the past, audiences are still not appreciating Mozart work. His resulting desperation is compounded when his father dies. In an effort to earn money, he writes The Magic Flute, “something for ordinary German people” Saltier suggests he include in his composition a focus on the Masons, the fraternal order of which both are members. While he composes The Magic Flute, Constance leaves with the children and his health deteriorates. He is continually taunted by dreams of a figure n gray, who compels him to write a requiem Mass.
When a member of the emperor’s court discovers that Mozart has exposed Masonic rituals in The Magic Flute, he is outraged. As a result, Mozart reputation and career are ruined. Soon after, when Mozart dies, Saltier admits to feeling a mixture of relief and pity. In the present, Saltier explains: “Slowly I understood the nature of God’s punishment…. This was my sentence: I must endure thirty years of being called “distinguished” by people incapable of distinguishing… And finally… When my nose had been rubbed in fame to louder through the world. And mine faded completely, till no one played it at all”.
Saltier admits he has attempted to convince the world that he poisoned Mozart, so that he will be remembered, if not in fame, then infamy, and so win his battle with DOD. He then cuts his throat. The ventricles tell the audience that Galleries efforts failed; he survived his attempted suicide and the public refused to believe he had murdered Mozart. The play ends with Saltier, in a gesture of benediction, telling the audience, “mediocrities everywhere-?now and to come-?I absolve you all. Amen. ” He then folds his arms high across his own breast in a gesture of self-sanctification. In character Antonio Saltier: was a famous musician composer who envied the prodigy talents of Mozart. From his personality, we can say he is a selfish, manipulative person who desired to be famous although he considered himself to be mediocre. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: was a famous musician composer with an innate talent. He wrote his first symphony at five, a concerto at four and a full opera at fourteen. He is described as a silly, giggly and nervous person who makes enemies easily. Constance Never: was the wife of Mozart, although she had a pretty singing voice, she wasn’t as Nell-known as her older sisters were.