SCHUMANN Life&times

1828

LIFE: He matriculates at Leipzig University to study for a law degree, but devotes most of his time to literature and music, including learning the piano under Friedrich Wieck.

TIMES: The Spanish painter Francisco de Goya, whose masterpieces include The Third of May 1808 chronicling the grim events of the Peninsular War, dies aged 82 in Bordeaux.

1856

LIFE: Two days before Robert’s death on 29 July, aged 46, Clara is allowed to visit him for the first time at Dr Franz Richarz’s sanatorium in Endenich, where he has been a patient since his suicide attempt in 1854.

TIMES: The signing of The Treaty of Paris on 30 March formally brings an end to the Crimean War. The Black Sea is declared neutral territory, with warships prohibited from entering it.

1810

LIFE: Born in Zwickau on 8 June, Robert is the fifth child of Johanna and August Schumann, a wealthy book seller, publisher and lexicographer. TIMES: Lord Byron swims across the Hellespont strait in Turkey, recreating the four-mile journey which, according to Greek myth, was made every day by Leander to be with his love, Hero.

1834

LIFE: With Friedrich Wieck and his friend Ludwig Schuncke, he launches the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, a journal containing features on music theory, reports and reviews.

TIMES: Led by Prussia, a number of German states form the Zollverein, a coalition in which border customs charges are abolished to promote freedom of trade and a degree of political unity.

1840

LIFE: In a year in which he turns his attention firmly towards song, he marries pianist Clara Wieck, the 20-year-old daughter of Friedrich, who has strongly opposed their relationship. TIMES: William Henry Harrison enjoys a landslide victory over Martin Van Buren in the US presidential election, only to die just 31 days after his inauguration the following year.

1850

LIFE: Soon after becoming municipal music director in Düsseldorf, he travels to Leipzig for the premiere of his only opera, Genoveva. It proves a flop at its premiere.

TIMES: In Weimar, Liszt conducts the first performance of Wagner’s Lohengrin. Still in exile after the 1849 Dresden Uprising, Wagner is unable to attend in person.