So, does anyone have an accual suggestion, or is everyone's just here to fool around?
Well, I agree with the actual suggestion that a biography might not be the best tool for appreciating a composer's music. For me, anyway, that would be approaching the situation from the wrong direction.
When I'm interested in the music of a specific composer, learning more about him may give me insight into his life and even help me overlook his human shortcomings—but I can't imagine the opposite being true, i.e., that gaining knowledge of a composer's life and circumstances would confer a better understanding of the musical qualities (or weaknesses) of his music.
But that's just me. Whatever works! A quick search at Amazon.com will turn up a number of contemporary biographies, including:
Robert Schumann: Herald of a "New Poetic Age," by John Daverio
Robert Schumann: Life and Death of a Musician, by John Worthen
Schumann: The Inner Voices of a Musical Genius, by Peter Ostwald
I find that last title especially intriguing. Unfortunately, there's such widespread disdain for Schumann on this board (and so little concession even that he
was a musical genius) that a personal review of any of them here is pretty unlikely.