Friedrich Wieck practice, however, he might not always have lived up to the ideals he described in the book "Piano and Song: How to Teach, How To Learn, and How to Form a Judgment of Musical Performances." When Robert Schumann was living and studying in the Wieck household, he reported seeing Wieck punishing his nine-year-old son, Alwyn, for playing the violin poorly, tearing at his hair and yelling, "You wretch, you scoundrel, is this the way you try to please your father?" Clara seemed unconcerned at the violent scene. Shocked, Schumann wrote in his diary, "Am I among human beings?" Besides the
Michael Wieck the building and used it until the few remaining Königsberg synagogues were banned. The Wiecks experienced the pain of parting with emigrating Jewish relatives and friends – most acutely when the Nazi regime in October 1941 began systematic deportations of German Jews to ghettos and concentration camps. However, because Wieck's parents were a mixed marriage – Kurt Wieck had no known recent Jewish ancestors – they were spared deportation and ultimately genocide, unlike most members of Königsberg's Jewish community, which dated back four centuries. Although the Wiecks experienced isolated acts of kindness from a few non-Jewish neighbors, they were tormented