“My intention was to paint a tone-picture of my life. The first movement depicts my youthful leanings towards art, a Romantic atmosphere, the inexpressible yearning for something I could neither express nor define, and also a kind of warning of my future misfortune […]; the outlook into a sad future, the tiny rays of hope of recovery; but remembering the promise of my early career, a feeling of painful regret.” — Bedřich Smetana, in a letter of April 1878, on his String Quartet in E minor.

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