Monday, January 19:
Yesterday evening I read by myself the 12 anonymous letters of an aesthetic heretic; thoroughly healthy views, yet one does not really understand why the author felt the need to express them, and anyway it is all taken from Beethoven and Art and Politics, though lacking the philosophical basis.
In the conservatory, a few untranslatable words omitted. Chose carpets and curtains. Letter from Richter: he has not been able to arrange anything in Vienna. In the evening we begin a book about India by a missionary from Basel. Richard finishes Richard III, great pleasure in his address to his troops. In him Shakespeare shows us the last convulsions of Norman power; but for the dream apparitions he would appear undefeated, unpunished; he does not care about his life, and is convinced of his right to the crown over such weaklings as Edward and Clarence.