Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt Volume II Part 34

After living in exile for ten years, my amnesty has become of less importance to me than the guarantee of an existence free from care and secure from discomfort for the rest of my life. Do not be surprised. The return to Germany is of relative value to me. The only positive gain would be my seeing you often and living together with you. The possible performances of my operas under my direction, would certainly bring me less enjoyment than exertion, care, trouble, and annoyance. I never had much pleasure in the performance of one of my operas, and shall have much less in future. My ideal demands have increased, compared with former times, and my sensitiveness has become much more acute during the last ten years while I lived in absolute separation from artistic public life. I fear that even you do not quite understand me in this respect, and you should believe my word all the more implicitly. Your nature and position in life and in the world are so entirely different from mine that you can scarcely realise my sensitiveness in this respect from your own consciousness.

Believe me implicitly when I tell you that the only reason for my continuing to live is the irresistible impulse of creating a number of works of art which have their vital force in me. I recognise beyond all doubt that this act of creating and completing alone satisfies me and fills me with a desire of life, which otherwise I should not understand. I can, on the other hand, do quite well without any chance of a performance. I see clearly that before the completion of "Tristan" my amnesty would absolutely place me in an awkward position; no expectation, not even that of producing "Lohengrin", could induce me to leave my present place of abode before I had finished my work. From this you may guess at other things. Any offer of a secured and comfortable existence would be of no value to me if it were coupled with the condition of my accepting the amnesty, and of doing certain services made possible thereby. I cannot and shall not accept an appointment or anything resembling it. What I demand, on the other hand, is the settlement upon me of an honourable and large pension, solely for the purpose of creating my works of art undisturbed and without regard for external success.

Being without property or subvention of any kind, I have to rely for my income upon my operas. He who has real knowledge of the nature of my works, and who feels and esteems their peculiar and differentiating qualities, must see that I, in my position towards such an inst.i.tution as our theatre, ought to be entirely relieved from the necessity of making commercial articles of my works. Any just-minded man must perceive that it would be quite unworthy of me to relinquish my freedom by giving my operas to managers without stipulating for their artistic interest, without choice, without preference for any particular theatre, or even by being compelled to offer them to such managers. This necessity has already filled me with much painful bitterness, and the worst of it is that even if I suppress my sense of honour to that extent, the receipts accruing to me are of such a nature that they place me, pecuniarily speaking, in a painful and alarming position. At times those receipts come in plentifully and unexpectedly, and in consequence bring with them all of a sudden perfect security and a certain tempting plenty. At other times they fall off for a long period and again quite unexpectedly; and this falling off, just because it could not be foreseen, is followed by want, care, and tribulation. If this is to be mended I must be relieved from the necessity of counting upon these receipts, and be placed in a position which will enable me to look upon them as an accidental increase of resources, which I can employ in adding certain comforts to my existence, and which I am able to dispense with without interfering with my sufficient and settled income, as soon as I find it desirable to withhold my operas from those theatres, the strength or the direction of which does not enable me to credit them with honest zeal for my work. In this manner, and by the position towards our abominable theatrical inst.i.tutions thus attained, I should be protected by my contemporaries, and enabled to continue my creations in accordance with my earnest desire and with the peculiarity of my artistic nature. An ample and fully secured pension can alone do this for me, and only a combination of several German princes whom I have inspired with sympathy can accomplish the desired object.

On such a combination I should have to insist, for the reason, more especially, that this pension, if it is to fulfil its object and to satisfy my somewhat refined and not altogether ordinary wants, must amount to at least 2,000 or 3,000 thalers. I do not blush in naming such a sum. My experience of what I want in accordance with my nature, and, perhaps I should add, the nature of my works, teaches me that I cannot well do with less; and on the other hand, it is well known that artists like Mendelssohn (although he was rich), have received equally large honorary salaries from one single quarter.

I ask you therefore, definitely and finally, whether you will take the initiative in this matter? At the same time I would draw your attention to the fact that, after mature consideration, I must abide by the character of my demand. An appointment at Weimar, although it might leave me at perfect liberty and even be equal to yours, I could not accept, because the salary would not be sufficient for my purpose. It would not help me radically, and would therefore imply all the dangers of a palliative measure.

Once more, I require an absolute settlement of my external circ.u.mstances, which will provide for and exercise a decided influence on my future artistic creativeness. I shall be forty- six next birthday, and therefore speak of about ten years at the utmost.

If you have reasons for not entering into my request, or for declining to concern yourself with it personally, let me know plainly and definitely. I could explain those reasons from your peculiar position, and they would not in the least interfere with our friends.h.i.+p. Let me know in that case whether you advise me to apply MYSELF to the Grand Duke of Weimar, in order to induce him to place himself at the head of the aforesaid combination of princes. If you do not think this advisable, I am determined to ask D. whether he will intercede for me with another prince. If he also refuses, my last resource will be to apply to that prince myself. On the success of this step will depend my further relations to Germany, as to which in such circ.u.mstances I have quite made up my mind.

My request, whether it be addressed to you, or D., or one of the princes, will be accompanied by a clear and convincing exposition of my circ.u.mstances, my position towards the artistic world, and my individual qualities, and wants. At the same time I shall state precisely what I promise to do in return for such a pension. In the first instance, and whether my return to Germany will be granted or not, I shall undertake to continue the creation of new works. All my works, present and future, will be given to the various court theatres gratis. Finally, as soon as I am allowed to return to Germany I will, by special desire, undertake to superintend in person the study and production of my operas, and, if it should be wished, of other works, the representation of which would be for the benefit and honour of art.

This letter, dear Franz, is the first I have written in this fateful new year 1859. It is addressed to you, and deals with a subject which will be of decisive influence on my future life.

May Heaven and our friends.h.i.+p reward it with success!

Answer me soon definitely and decisively, for I repeat that I do not want my request to be in any way connected with the amnesty.

A thousand cordial greetings to the ladies, to whom I shall soon write a pleasant letter.

Your

R. W.

281.

DEAREST FRANZ,

Have you NOTHING AT ALL to say to me? What is to become of me, if EVERY ONE ignores me?

Your

R.

VENICE.

282.

MY DEAR FRANZ,

On reading my letter again, you will probably have discovered what was the meaning of my jocular complaint--"You answer me much too pathetically and seriously." You must have seen by the exact terms of my letter, somewhat loosely worded though it was, that by your answer I meant the manner in which you speak of my conduct towards D. with regard to "Rienzi." As this part of my letter has remained obscure to you, I add the following words of explanation. My letter about the withdrawal of "Rienzi" was written with a view to being shown, because I had referred D. to you. I thought, however, you would see that I was annoyed by the difficulties he made about the honorarium, and by the remote date for which payment was promised. I was in hopes that my letter discussing the withdrawal of the opera would help me quickly to the honorarium, and perhaps increase the amount a little. I had unfortunately reckoned upon this income before the new year, and relied upon it all the more because I had on a former occasion explained my difficult position to your sympathetic heart. When I forwarded D.'s last letter to you my intention was to complain of his pedantic statement: "The honorarium will be paid to you after the first performance,"--a statement to which I am no longer accustomed at any other theatre. I further hoped to induce you-- as indeed I clearly indicated--to effect at least the immediate payment of the honorarium. As my letter about the withdrawal of "Rienzi" was written with a view to being shown, it may very likely have puzzled you; but I know that it was intended only to frighten D., and to supply you with a weapon for forcing him into a decent and business-like att.i.tude. In consequence, I hoped that the success of this little manoeuvre would secure me the receipt of the wretched twenty-five louis d'or before the new year. Upon this sum I looked as my only certainty, because you were there to get it for me, while the moneys which I expected from other quarters represented only so many hopes which might be delusive.

At last New Year's Eve came. My money was all gone; my watch, the snuff-box of the Grand Duke, and the bonbonniere of the Princess, the only valuables I possess, had been p.a.w.ned; and of the money I had got for them only one and a half napoleons remained. When, on New Year's Eve, on entering my lonely room, I found your letter, I confess I was weak enough to hope that it would announce to me the imminent arrival of the twenty-five louis d'or, in consequence of the successful demonstration against D. which I thought I had made. Instead of this, I found, in reference to this matter, a serious explanation of your relations with D., which, as I see from this letter, have already become matter of bitter and troublesome experience to you. I had foreseen this, and made you silent reproaches when D. was called to Weimar through your means. I quite understood that, owing to prolonged irritation, you were, on receipt of my last letter, in a mood which misled you as to the character of my threat to withdraw "Rienzi." You recognized in me also the sympathetic annoyance at all the unworthy things we meet with, and you overlooked the fact that a poor devil like me cannot afford to be serious. Therefore you entered seriously and bitterly into my withdrawal of "Rienzi," which, after the insults you had received, was welcome to you, and I, for my part, had to witness on that wretched New Year's Eve the destruction of my last secret, but none the less certain, hope of receiving money. The great disappointment of that moment would, at any other time, have probably made me reticent and silent, but the long-expected and ardently-longed- for boon of your sympathy for "Tristan" evoked in me a kind of convulsive excitement. Once more, your joy at my first act had brought you so near to my innermost heart that I thought I might, at such a moment, make the most outrageous demand on you. That feeling I expressed, if I remember rightly, in the words, "For my paroxysm of joyous excitement your delight at 'Tristan' is responsible." Dearest friend, at that moment I could not even think of the possibility of a misunderstanding. Everything being so certain and infallible between us, I went to the opposite extreme of reproaching you because you had left me in the lurch with regard to money matters, and because you had taken my diplomatic demonstration against D. in a much too earnest and pathetic sense, my only interest in him being comprised in a little money. I further indicated that the various considerations, which to you, being on the spot, and holding an official position, might appear serious and of great moment, did not exist for me at all, the only connection between myself and the theatres, and their public art, being solely that of money.

THAT OF MONEY! Yes, so it is; and with that you reproach me. You should rather pity me. Do you not think that I should prefer your position in regard to the performance of your own works because money is no object to you? My first letter of this year will have shown you that I also am capable of considering the matter in a serious and literally pathetic, i.e., suffering mood.

Enough of this. Your letter, received today, has affected me deeply, as you will easily understand. Yet I am calm and full of hope. Your curious misunderstanding in applying my reproach, that you answer me in "too earnest and pathetic a style," to your delight at "Tristan", must by this time have become clear to yourself. I feel quite confident that any unprejudiced friend, to whom you may show our last letters, will persuade you, in spite of your prejudice, that my humorous and playfully extravagant reproach referred only to your idea of my intended withdrawal of "Rienzi," and, generally speaking, to the expectation I had of D.

and the whole slough of our German operatic theatres. You now know the position which excited me to this kind of desperate humour, and I hope it will be a long time before I again have to change my last napoleon at the telegraph office.

It is you, dear friend, who are suffering and needing comfort; for the extraordinary letter which you found it possible to send me can only have sprung from a terrible mental irritation. I hope in the meantime that this lengthy explanation and disclosure of the misunderstanding into which you had succeeded in falling will be some comfort to you. I have none other to offer. If your irritation concerned me alone, this letter should dispel it altogether. Let me further a.s.sure you that you have hurt me in no way, for your arrows did not hit me; their barbs stuck in your own heart. This letter, I hope, will free you of them.

One more thing let me ask you today. Do not answer my letter of January 2nd. Look upon it as if it had not been written, or, at least, not received. I am fully aware that you are not able to put yourself in my place with such goodwill and understanding as would enable you to do justice to my letter. Please forget it altogether; in that case, I will on my part pardon your reproaches, you curious, dear, dear friend.

Farewell for today.

I am sure I have not lost you.

Your

RICHARD WAGNER.

VENICE, January 7th, 1859.

In order to set your mind at rest, I inform you that, by a curious and lucky accident, some money, which I had long expected and already despaired of, arrived here from Vienna in the first week of the new year. My three valuables (let a kind world forgive me this luxury!) are out of p.a.w.n. For the present I am provided for, and do not apprehend any new stoppage of my resources just yet.

May the friendly remembrance of me be revived in you.

Your

RICHARD W.

283.

Your greeting, dearest Richard, has brought me the enchanting forgetfulness of all that should ever be far from us. Receive my thanks, and let us continue to suffer patiently together.

Before you had written to ask me not to mention your proposal, I had communicated it at some length in the proper quarter. As I might have expected, after numerous similar conversations (which I never mention to you) there were several reasons for not accepting it. Perhaps I shall be able to broach the subject again later on, and obtain a more favourable result; to the extent, I mean, that a small sum will be sent to you. Anything more cannot be hoped for.

I must ask you to believe that I am extremely grieved always to have to tell you things of this kind.

In your letter to Princess M. you speak of a change of abode, and of your desire to settle in a large town. In case, against my sincere hope, the permission to return to Germany should be permanently refused to you, and you prefer to live in a large town, I still think that Paris would be the most comfortable, the most convenient, and even the cheapest place for you. I know your dislike of this city pleine de boue et de fumee; but I think that if you were to live there for any length of time you would feel more at home, apart from which we should be tolerably near each other, so that I might visit you frequently.

Have you had any further news from Carlsruhe? The newspapers continue to announce a performance of "Tristan" in September, and I do not relinquish the hope that at that time a favourable turn in your affairs will take place. Anyhow, this summer must not pa.s.s without our seeing each other.

Once more, thanks for your greeting; the song is indescribably beautiful.

Most cordially your

F. L.

WEYMAR, February 17th, 1859.

From Vienna you will soon receive through my cousin a small collection of NOTES.

All that is kind to C. R.