The work Schmerzprobe (pain test) for viola solo written in Chicago in January 1993 was commissioned by the English composer Andrew Toovey. It belongs to a series of studies for the opera Cassandra, reflects (as all the other studies) certain aspects of Christa Wolf's novel Cassandra and refers to the following section:

...Myrine, seeing me smile as I talked of Aeneas, shrieked: Unteachable, that's what I was. I laid my hand on the napa of her neck untill she was still, and from the wall beside the Scaean Gate both of us watched the sun sink into the sea. We knew it was the last time we could stand together this way. I am testing for pain. I am probing my memory the way the doctor probes a limb to see whether it has atrophied. Perhaps pain dies before we die. That information, if true, must be passed on; but to whom? Of those here who speak my language, there is none who will not die with me. I make the pain test and think about the goodbyes. Each one was different. In the end we identified each other by whether or not we knew this was goodbye. Sometmes we just raised our hands lightly. Sometimes we embraced. Aeneas and I did not touch each other anymore. It seems to me that his eyes, whose color I could not fathom, were above me for an infinite time...

Gerhard Stäbler