Talent works, genius creates.

The poet sees better than other mortals. I do not see things as they are, but according to my own subjective impression, and this makes life easier and simpler.

My whole life has been a twenty years struggle between poetry and prose, or, if you like to call it so, Music and Law.

To compose is to remember music that has never been written.

When you play, do not trouble yourself as to who is listening. Yet always play as though a master listened to you.

An evil fate has deprived me of the full use of my right hand, so that I am not able to play my compositions as I feel them. The trouble with my hand is that certain fingers have become so weak, probably through writing and playing too much at one time, that I can hardly use them.

You should diligently play scales and fingerpractices. There are many, however, who believe they'll achieve all, by practicing daily on technique for hours on end, up till high age. It's like practicing every day to enumerate the alfabet faster and faster. One would think one could make better use of their valuable time.