He is thinner, taller, younger - more boyish-looking - than expected, but he is also the shyest and most nervous human being I have ever seen. He chews not merely his nails but his fingers, twitches his pouty mouth and chin, chain-smokes, wiggles his nose in constant adjustment of his spectacles, looks querulous one moment and ready to cry the next. His hands tremble, he stutters, his whole frame wobbles when he shakes hands:There is no betrayal of the thoughts behind those frightened, very intelligent eyes.

Many consider that Shostakovich is the greatest 20th-century composer. In his 15 symphonies, 15 quartets, and in other works he demonstrated mastery of the lar…

He did not write about this war and that revolution, but about war and revolution in general, the state of mind and emotion, not facts.

Not since the time of Berlioz has a symphonic composer created such a stir. In far-away America, great conductors vie with each other for the jus primae noctis…

Could we teach taste or genius by rules, they would be no longer taste and genius.

He had the satisfied countenance of a man who has never succeeded in boring himself.

Genius still means to me, in my Russian, fastidiousness and pride of phrase, a unique dazzling gift. The gift of James Joyce, and not the talent of Henry James.