David Goodall (botanist) should have full citizenship rights including the right to assisted suicide." Goodall travelled first to France to visit family, and then to Liestal, Switzerland, where two doctors cleared him to proceed with his assisted suicide, although he was not terminally ill. In Switzerland, Exit International organised a press conference during which Goodall answered journalists' questions and sang the first few lines of the fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, based on Schiller's poem Ode to Joy, in German. Goodall ended his life on 10 May while listening to Beethoven's Symphony No. 9. Surrounded by his family, Goodall pushed a lever
Symphony No. 8 (Beethoven) tradition in making the last movement the weightiest of the four. The work was begun in the summer of 1812, immediately after the completion of the Seventh Symphony. At the time Beethoven was 41 years old. As Antony Hopkins has noted, the cheerful mood of the work betrays nothing of the grossly unpleasant events that were taking place in Beethoven's life at the time, which involved his interference in his brother Johann's love life. The work took Beethoven only four months to complete, and is, unlike many of his works, without dedication. The premiere took place on 27 February 1814,