One day at an exhibition of masks, Beethoven returned to the life of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt. The writer recalled that he had been passionate about him in his adolescence.
Why did Beethoven withdraw? Why does today’s man no longer experience the same emotions, the same romanticism and private storms, the same joy? Who has died? Beethoven or us? And who is the assassin?
Schmitt’s essay is followed by Kiki van Beethoven, the story of a radiant woman in her sixties whose life, and the life of her three friends, is changed by music. A fable about lost youth and buried secrets.