Franz Liszt The Weimar Years, 1848-1861

"Walker is especially good at sorting out the details of Liszt's spiritual life. The son of a father who had spent two years as a Franciscan novice, Liszt aspired to the priesthood in his youth. Yet from the time he took lower orders to become an abbe in the Catholic Church at 53, skeptics have branded him a religious poseur, a judgment abetted by Liszt's lighthearted description of himself as 'half Gypsy, half Franciscan,' often solemnly quoted by others to impugn his integrity. But Walker's take is firm: in becoming an abbe, Liszt was, as he believed, 'fulfilling all the antecedents of [his] youth' and abiding by his deepest convictions."Walker, Alan is the author of 'Franz Liszt The Weimar Years, 1848-1861' with ISBN 9780801497216 and ISBN 0801497213.