Richard Strauss's Framework

Strauss set this day down in a letter from Egypt in 1892, where he was convalescing and orchestrating his first opera. He rose at eight, bathed, and breakfasted on three eggs, tea and home-made jam, then took a half-hour stroll by the palm grove on the Nile. From ten to one he worked on the orchestration. Lunch was at one, followed by Schopenhauer or a game of cards for small stakes. He worked again from three to four, took tea, and walked until six to watch the sunset, wrote letters or composed until seven, dined, then talked and smoked, eight to twelve cigarettes a day. At 9:30 he went to his room, read for half an hour and slept at ten. He said the urge to compose came to him as naturally as a cow gives milk. It is a convalescent's day, not his lifelong one, and that is its use: a ten-hour night, four hours of creative work in two sittings, ninety minutes of walking, and a great deal of eating, reading and company. If you are coming back from something, this is the pace.