Editing Anton Webern (section)

===1939–1945: Hope and disillusionment during World War II===

====Swiss and ''Reich'' prospects====
Webern's mature music was performed mostly outside the {{lang|de|Reich}}, where only his tonal music and arrangements were allowed as works not in the style of a {{lang|de|"[[Glossary of Nazi Germany#J|Judenknecht]]"}}. His arrangement of two of Schubert's ''German Dances'' was performed in Leipzig and broadcast in the {{lang|de|Reich}} and Fascist Italy (1941).{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=537–538}} His Passacaglia was considered for a Viennese contemporary music festival in 1942, [[Karl Böhm]] or [[Wilhelm Furtwängler]] conducting, but this did not happen.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=537–538}} [[Hans Rosbaud]] likely performed it in [[History of Strasbourg#Second World War|occupied Strasbourg]] that year, and [[Luigi Dallapiccola]] sought to have it performed in Venice in 1943.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=537–538}} [[Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt]] planned Webern's arrangement of the six-voice [[ricercar]] from Bach's ''[[Musical Offering]]'' at the {{lang|de|[[Deutsche Oper Berlin]]|italics=no}} in 1943, but war intervened.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=537–538}}

Supported by [[Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Neue Musik|IGNM-Sektion Basel]], the [[Orchester Musikkollegium Winterthur]], and [[Werner Reinhart]], Webern attended three Swiss concerts, his last trips outside the {{lang|de|Reich}}.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=523–525, 548–552, 579–580}} In 1940, [[Erich Schmid (conductor)|Erich Schmid]] conducted Op. 1 in [[Winterthur]]; soprano [[Marguerite Gradmann-Lüscher]] sang Op. 4 and most of Op. 12 (not No. 3) at the [[Musik-Akademie der Stadt Basel]], Schmid accompanying. In Feb. 1943, Scherchen gave the world premiere of Op. 30 at the {{ill|Stadthaus (Winterthur)|lt=Winterthur Stadthaus|de|Stadthaus (Winterthur)|display=1}}. Webern intimated to Willi Reich that he might immigrate there, joking (Oct. 1939) "Anything of the sort did seem quite out of the question for me!"{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=499–500, 523}} But Webern failed to find employment, even as a formality, likely due to [[anti-German sentiment]] in the context of [[Swiss neutrality]] and [[Switzerland during the World Wars#Jewish refugees|refugee laws]].{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=525, 591–592}}

In the ''Reich'', he met with former Society violist [[Othmar Steinbauer]] about a formal teaching role in Vienna in early 1940, but nothing materialized.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=237, 538}} He lectured at the homes of [[Erwin Ratz]] and {{ill|Carl Prohaska|de}}'s widow Margaret (1940–1942).{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=539}} Many private pupils came to him between 1940 and 1943, even from afar, among them briefly Hartmann.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=538–540}} Hartmann, who opposed the Nazis, remembered that Webern counseled him to respect authority, at least publicly, for the sake of order.{{sfn|Krones|2007|loc=Biographie, 1939–1945}}

====Wartime hopes and reality====
Sharing in wartime public sentiment at the height of Hitler's popularity (spring 1940), Webern expressed high hopes, crediting him as "unique" and ''"singular"''{{efn|Webern emphasized.}} for "the new state for which the seed was laid twenty years ago". These were patriotic letters to Joseph Hueber, an active soldier, [[baritone]], close friend, and [[mountaineering]] companion who often sent Webern gifts.{{sfnm|Bailey Puffett|1998|1loc=86, 166–175|Johnson|1999|2loc=219–222|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|3loc=XI, 18, 283, 292, 333, 337, 339, 345, 356, 370, 372, 416–417, 448, 467, 517, 525–533, 538–539, 544–548, 550, 552, 555, 569, 573–575, 578, 591, 641–643|Ross|2007|4loc=352}} Indeed, Hueber had just sent Webern ''[[Mein Kampf]]''.{{efn|Webern's immediate reply (March 1940) was: "I ... with reference ... to my ... experiences ... wondered how such opposites could have become possible next to each other."{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=526}}}}

Unaware of [[Stefan George]]'s aversion to the Nazis, Webern reread ''{{ill|Das neue Reich (George)|lt=Das neue Reich|de|Das neue Reich (George)|display=1}}'' and marveled suggestively at the wartime leader envisioned therein, but "I am not taking a position!" he wrote active soldier, singer, and onetime Social Democrat, Hans Humpelstetter.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=527–530}} For Johnson, "Webern's own image of a {{lang|de|neue Reich}} was never of this world; if his politics were ultimately complicitous it was largely because his [[utopian]] apoliticism played so easily into ... the [[status quo]]."{{sfn|Johnson|1999|loc=221}}

By Aug. 1940, Webern depended financially on his children.{{sfnm|Bailey Puffett|1998|1loc=86, 166|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|2loc=522–523}} He sought wartime emergency relief funds from {{lang|de|Künstlerhilfe Wien|italic=no}} and the {{lang|de|[[Reichsmusikkammer]]|italic=no}} {{ill|Künstlerdank|de}} (1940–1944), which he received despite indicating non-membership in the Nazi Party on an application.{{sfnm|Bailey Puffett|1998|1loc=168-172|Kater|1997|2loc=74|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|3loc=544–545}} Whether Webern ever [[Party identification#Party membership|joined]] the party was unknown.{{sfn|Bailey Puffett|1998|loc=166-172}}{{efn|In the tradition of parties seeking a dues-paying mass membership, formal NSDAP affiliation could oblige one to pay registration fees or [[Political finance#Sources of funds|dues]], or even to labor.{{sfn|Turner|1985|loc=59–60, 113–124, 157, 292–293, 347, 403}} Nazis dissuaded some prospective members from formal affiliation as a strategic matter.{{sfn|Turner|1985|loc=143–144, 347–349}}}} This represented his only income after 1942.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=544–545}} He nearly exhausted his savings by 1944.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=544–545}}

His 1943–1945 letters were strewn with references to bombings, death, destruction, privation, and the disintegration of local order, but several grandchildren were born.{{sfn|Bailey Puffett|1998|loc=183}} In Dec. 1943, aged 60, he wrote from a [[barrack]] that he was working 6&nbsp;am–5&nbsp;pm as an air-raid protection police officer, [[conscripted]] into the [[war effort]].{{sfn|Bailey Puffett|1998|loc=183}} He corresponded with Willi Reich about [[Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Neue Musik|IGNM-Sektion Basel]]'s concert marking his sixtieth, in which [[Paul Baumgartner]] played Op. 27, Walter Kägi <!-- note: prob brother of composer Werner Kaegi but no access to the ed of the R Lexicon in the WK article to ver --> Op. 7, and [[August Wenzinger]] Op. 11. Gradmann-Lüscher sang both Opp. 3 and the world premiere of 23.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=553–554}} For Schoenberg's 70th birthday (1944), Webern asked Reich to convey "my most heartfelt remembrances, ... longing! ... hopes for a happy future!"{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=592}} In Feb. 1945, Webern's only son Peter, intermittently conscripted since 1940,{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=526, 552}} was killed in an air attack; airstrike sirens interrupted the family's mourning at the funeral.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=600–603}}

====Refuge and death in Mittersill====
[[File:Mittersill Webern-Grab 1.png|thumb|upright|Grave of Webern and his wife Minna at the cemetery in [[Mittersill]]]]

The Weberns assisted Schoenberg's first son Görgi during the war; with the [[Red Army]]'s April 1945 arrival imminent, they gave him their Mödling apartment, the property and childhood home of Webern's son-in-law Benno Mattl.{{efn|Schoenberg was unable to secure Görgi's emigration despite many attempts. Between the Russian–German [[language barrier]] and Nazi munitions and propaganda in the apartment's storeroom, Görgi was held and nearly executed as a Nazi spy but was able to convince a German-speaking Jewish officer otherwise. Görgi and his family remained there until 1969.{{sfnm|Greissle-Schönberg|2003a|Krasner and Seibert|1987|2loc=345-346|Schoenberg|2018|3loc=209}}}} Görgi later told Krasner that Webern "felt he'd betrayed his best friends."{{sfn|Krasner and Seibert|1987|loc=346}} The Weberns fled west, resorting to traveling partly on foot to [[Mittersill]] to rejoin their family of "17 persons pressed together in the smallest possible space".{{sfn|Bailey Puffett|1998|loc=183–184}}

On the night of 15 Sept. 1945, Webern was outside smoking when he was shot and killed by a US soldier in an apparent accident.{{sfnm|Bailey Puffett|1998|1loc=185–191|Krasner and Seibert|1987|2loc=346|Moldenhauer|1961|3loc=85, 102, 1141–16|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|4loc=632}} He had been following Thomas Mann's work, which the Nazis had burned, noting in 1944 that Mann had finished ''[[Joseph and His Brothers]]''.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=620, 680n27}} In his last notebook entry, Webern quoted [[Rainer Maria Rilke]]: "Who speaks of victory? To endure is everything."{{sfnm|Bailey Puffett|1998|1loc=164|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|2loc=619–620}}{{efn|Webern had not set Rilke's work since Op. 8.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=113–115, 132–134, 138, 190, 204}} Schoenberg dedicated a 1915 setting of Rilke's "{{lang|de|Alle, welche dich suchen|italic=no}}", Op. 22/ii, to Webern.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=212}}}}

Webern's wife Minna suffered final years of grief, poverty, and loneliness as friends and family continued emigrating. She wished Webern lived to see more success.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}} With the abolition of {{lang|de|Entartete Kunst|italic=no}} policies, {{ill|Alfred Schlee|de}} solicited her for hidden manuscripts; thus Opp. 17, 24–25, and 29–31 were published.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}} She worked to get Webern's 1907 Piano Quintet published via Kurt List.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}}

In 1947 she wrote Diez, now in the US, that by 1945 Webern was "firmly resolved to go to England".{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}} Likewise, in 1946 she wrote DJ Bach in London: "How difficult the last eight years had been for him. ... [H]e had only the one wish: to flee from this country. But one was caught, without a will of one's own. ... It was close to the limit of endurance what we had to suffer."{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}} Minna died in 1949.{{sfn|Moldenhauer and Moldenhauer|1978|loc=638–643}}