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surviving sketch-leaf (SK) is anything to judge by. 19 A further note at the beginning
of Act 2 in the play reads: ‘dne 16.II.1895 zap.[očata] instru.[mentace]’ [16 February
1895 instrumentation begun]. 20 Janáček himself later maintained, in a letter to Otakar
Nebuška, that for the first time in an opera he wrote directly into full score, which was
then transcribed into vocal score. 21 Although the progression from short-score to
‘instrumentation’ seems to contradict this assertion, it is probable that the first fully
worked-out version of the score (i.e. beyond mere sketch or draft state) was indeed in
full score. Certainly the nature of the manuscript vocal score reduction (ŠVS) copied
out for Janáček by Josef Štross 22 suggests such a process: it is for the most part more
obviously a reduction than a pianistically conceived original (unlike VIII/16), though
several minor discrepancies between it and the manuscript full score (ŠFS) point to a
common ancestor, probably Janáček’s autograph full score which he subsequently
destroyed. 23 In any event, by mid-1896 Act 1 was probably substantially complete,
according to ideas advanced by John Tyrrell. 24 Janáček himself later pointed out, in
19 SK = autograph sketch-leaf, undated, containing fragments of Act 1 Scene 2 (voices and
accompaniment), BmJA, A30.380; see CHAPTER 2, §2.1. Concerning a further, very brief sketch
fragment, see Štědroň 1970b.
20 JODA, 46–7.
21 JODA, JP9 (letter to Otakar Nebuška, 22 February 1917).
22 Josef Štross (1826–1912), oboist and Janáček’s chief copyist from the first version of Šárka (1887) to
the first version of Osud (1905).
23 According to the reminiscences of the Janáčeks’ maid, Marie Stejskalová (1873–1968), the autograph
manuscript was burnt in the stove when the Janáčeks moved in the summer of 1910 from their rented
apartment in Staré Brno (Klášterní 2) to their new house (Giskrova [now Kounicova] 30) in the grounds
of the Brno Organ School (Trkanová 1959, 94). From a practical point of view, the autograph score
had been superseded by Štross’s authorised copies, into which the subsequent layers of revision were
entered; by 1910 the first printed edition of the vocal score had also appeared (KPU, published in
1908). One can only guess as to the wider possible motives for Janáček burning the autograph, given
the associations of the later stages of composition with the fatal illness of his daughter Olga (see
below).
24 Tyrrell 1998, 14–15, and JYL i, 422–4; not 1897 as had previously been thought.
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