Downer - Mud Bath

Liszt himself, as if putting an end to a painful issue, wrote to Antalu Augus on January 14, 1860: “Patriotism is, without a doubt, a great and admirable feeling, but the excessive fervor of its manifestation erases the necessary boundaries, and its only engine becomes febrile irritation; it happens that they arrange a storm in a glass of water. However, I, however, am firmly convinced of my ability to fulfill my destiny and will constantly strive to glorify the homeland ... by works in the field of the artist. Perhaps not quite as some patriots suggest, for which the “Rakoczi March” means roughly the same as the Qur'an for the Caliph Omar; perhaps not quite like those who would gladly burn — like the Omar Library of Alexandria — all German music under the wonderful pretext that it is either not represented in the “Rakoczi March”,or not worth anything. Perhaps not quite so, but nonetheless I am attached to Hungary. Let me tell you again that the noise made around my work on gypsies made me think that I’m even bigger than my opponents, manic Hungarians, because loyalty has always been one of the characteristic features of our national character. ”