1836-1839.
For nine months, from the Easter of 1836 to the opening of the new year,
1837, Wagner was without engagement. It was a period of hardship and
suffering. In a most miserable plight he went to Leipzic and Berlin,
energetically exerting himself to get his opera, “The Novice of Palermo”
accepted. He met with plenty of promises but no performances. His needs
became more pressing. Debts had been incurred and the prospect of paying
them was of the gloomiest. An ordinary mortal would have sunk under such
overwhelming trouble, but Wagner was made of sterner stuff. His
indomitable self-reliance and pluck, based upon an abnormal self-esteem,
ever kept alight the lamp of hope within him, and sustained him through
sadder times than this. True, he had not proved to the world that he was
a genius, but he, himself, was fully convinced of it. He had written two
operas, a symphony, and other works, and though they did not surpass or
even equal what had been accomplished by other artists, yet for all that
he was strongly imbued with a consciousness of the greatness of his own
power in the tonal and poetic arts. He was convinced that he had a
mission to fulfil, a new art gospel to preach, and, too, that he would
succeed. The death-bed prediction of his step-father that he would be
“something” would be fulfilled.
As far as his art creations show, this was a period of non-productivity.
But it is impossible to suppose that Wagner was idle. Genius is never
inactive. If not visibly at work the reflective faculties are certain to
be actively employed. Though beset with every conceivable worldly
trouble, depending for daily wants on what he could borrow, he, with
alarming temerity, married.
It was on the 24th November, 1836; the bride, Fräulein Wilhelmina
Planer, leading actress of the Magdeburg company. She was the daughter
of a working spindle-maker. It was not the known possession of any
histrionic gift that caused her to become a professional actress, but a
very natural desire, as the eldest of the family, to increase the
resources of the household. Spindle-making was not a profitable calling,
and with a family, other help was gladly welcomed. But, as necessity has
oft discovered and forced to the front many a talent that would have
lain hidden from the world, so now was Magdeburg astonished by the
presence of an unquestionably gifted artist. Minna Planer played the
leading characters in tragedy and comedy. When off the stage her bearing
was quiet and unobtrusive. No theatrical trick or display indicated the
actress. And, after she had finally quitted stage life, it had been
impossible to suppose that the soft-spoken, retiring, shy little woman
had ever successfully impersonated important tragic rôles.
[Sidenote: _MINNA A HOUSE-WIFE._]
Minna was handsome, but not strikingly so. Of medium height, slim
figure, she had a pair of soft gazelle-like eyes which were a faithful
index of a tender heart. Her look seemed to bespeak your clemency, and
her gentle speech secured at once your good-will. Her movements in the
house were devoid of everything approaching bustle. Quick to anticipate
your thoughts, your wish was complied with before it had been expressed.
Her bearing was that of the gentle nurse in the sick-chamber. It was joy
to be tended by her. She was full of heart’s affection, and Wagner let
himself be loved. Her nature was the opposite of his. He was passionate,
strong-willed, and ambitious: she was gentle, docile, and contented. He
yearned for conquest, to have the world at his feet: she was happy in
her German home, and desired no more than permission to minister to him.
From the first she followed him with bowed head. To his exuberant
speech, his constant discourses on art, and his position in the future,
she lent a willing, attentive ear. She could not follow him, she was not
able to reason his incipient revolutionary art notions, to combat his
seemingly extravagant theories; but to all she was sympathetic,
sanguine, and consoling,--“a perfect woman, nobly planned,” as
Wordsworth sweetly sings. As years rolled by and the genius of Wagner
assumed more definite shape and grew in strength, she was less able to
comprehend the might of his intellect. To have written “The Novice of
Palermo” at twenty-three, and to have been received so cordially was to
her unambitious heart the zenith of success. More than that she could
not understand, nor did she ever realize the extent of the wondrous
gifts of her husband. After twenty years of wedded life it was much the
same. We were sitting at lunch in the trimly kept Swiss chalet at Zurich
in the summer of 1856, waiting for the composer of the then completed
“Rienzi,” “Dutchman,” “Tannhäuser,” and “Lohengrin” to come down from
his scoring of the “Nibelungen,” when in full innocence she asked me,
“Now, honestly, is Richard such a great genius?” On another occasion,
when he was bitterly animadverting on his treatment by the public, she
said, “Well, Richard, why don’t you write something for the gallery?”
And yet, notwithstanding her inaptitude, Wagner was ever considerate,
tender, and affectionate towards her. He was not long in discovering her
inability to understand him, but her many good qualities and domestic
virtues endeared her greatly to him. She had one quality of surpassing
value in any household presided over by a man of Wagner’s thoughtless
extravagance. She was thrifty and economical. At all periods of his life
Wagner could not control his expenditure. He was heedless, relying
always upon good fortune. But Minna was a skilled financier, and he knew
this. For years their lot was uphill, sometimes a hard struggle for bare
existence, and through all the devotion and homely love of the woman
soothed and cheered the nervous, irritable Wagner. When their means
enabled them to enjoy the comforts of life without first anxiously
counting the cost, Minna was possessed of one thought, her husband and
his happiness. And Wagner knew it and gratefully appreciated the heart’s
devotion of the worshipping woman. Home was her paradise, her husband
the king. Love, simple, trusting love, was her religion, and no greater
testimony to the noble work of a genuine woman could be offered than
that of the poet Milton in his “Paradise Lost”:--
Nothing lovelier can be found
In woman, than to study household good.
[Sidenote: _DIRECTOR AT KÖNIGSBERG._]
Throughout his career Wagner shook off the troubles of daily life with
an elasticity truly remarkable. But now he must do something. He had
incurred the most sacred of all obligations, to provide for his wife,
and employment of some description was a pressing necessity. Viewed from
an artistic point, his lost appointment had been a success. He had
acquired all the skill of an efficient conductor and had familiarized
himself with a large number of opera scores. But what had he done with
his own gifts? The miserable finale of the Magdeburg episode, and his
increased responsibilities, made him seriously reflect on this past year
and a half. True he had composed an entire opera. But of what material
was it made? He had regretfully to acknowledge that it was not as he
would wish it. He had thrown over his household gods to worship Baal. He
had rejected Weber and Beethoven, “his adored idols,” to dress his
thoughts in attractive, showy, French attire. He had forsaken heartfelt
truth for a graceful exterior. And what had he gained by imitating Auber
and Rossini? Not even the satisfaction of public success. And why? His
models spoke as they felt, whilst he clothed his thoughts in a borrowed
garb. He was now conscious that he had but to express himself in his own
language to convince others of the truth of his art gospel.
Some such similar post as at Magdeburg was what he now desired. There he
would be Wagner himself. But in these early years smiling fortune was
not always his happy companion. Nearly a year elapses before he again
finds himself directing an operatic company. This time it is at
Königsberg.
[Sidenote: _CONDUCTS ORCHESTRAL CONCERTS._]
But before accompanying the weary artist to his new home some mature
reflections of Wagner on his Magdeburg period are worthy of notice. His
elevation to the post of music director of the Magdeburg theatre was a
joyful moment. For the first time he would be sole controller of
operatic performances. When a youth he had been revolted by the
slatternly manner in which theatre conductors had led the performances.
Even the Gewandhaus concerts had not been altogether satisfactory.
Something then was lacking in the ensemble. Now was his opportunity. The
mechanical time-beating prevalent among conductors of opera houses would
find no place with the ardent youthful composer. He first secured the
affection of the singers by evincing a personal interest in their public
success. His born actor’s skill enabled him to illustrate how such a
character should move, whilst with the orchestra he would sing passages
and rehearse one phrase incessantly until he was satisfied. He was
indefatigable. The secret of his success was his earnestness. He knew
what he wanted, which was half-way to securing it. The company seems to
have been fairly intelligent and to have responded freely to his wishes,
but the audiences were phlegmatic. Magdeburg was a garrison city, and
the audiences were domineered by the cold reserve observed by the
military. Wagner thought of all publics the worst was a military one.
Effusive exhibitions of joy they regard as indecorous and unseemly, and
the absence of spontaneous enthusiasm exercises a depressing effect on
artists. Among the operas he conducted were Auber’s “Masaniello” and
Rossini’s “William Tell.” Both of them were favourites of his. At that
period, 1836, they stood out in bold relief from modern and ancient
operas. Their melodies were fresh and graceful, and a dramatic
truthfulness pervaded them which to the embryo imitator of the Greek
tragedy was a strong recommendation. Further, the revolutionary subjects
were congenial to the outlaw of 1848. But Auber and Rossini were soon to
be eclipsed by the clever Hebrew, Meyerbeer, and it is this last writer
who in a couple of years impels Wagner to leave his fatherland for
Paris. It is Meyerbeer’s works that he is now about to conduct at
Königsberg, where we shall at once follow him.
The time he spent in Königsberg was a prolongation of the miserable
existence which had followed the breaking up of the Magdeburg company,
intensified now, alas, by anxiety for his young wife. It was unenlivened
by any gleam of even passing sunlight. The time dragged heavily, and was
never referred to without a shudder. In later years, in the presence of
his first wife, he has compassionately remarked, “Yes, poor Minna had a
hard time of it then, and after the first few months of drudgery no
doubt repented of her bargain.” To which the gentle Minna would reply by
a look full of tender affection. Wagner’s references to the devotion and
untiring energy of his wife during the Königsberg year of distress
always affected him.
He began his public life at Königsberg by conducting orchestral concerts
in the town theatre. This led to his appointment as music director of
the theatre. The operatic stage was then governed almost entirely by
Meyerbeer, “Robert le Diable” and “Le Prophète,” both recent novelties,
being the great attraction. They met with an enormous success
everywhere. Meyerbeer was in Paris, the idol of the populace. A man
possessed of undeniable genuine merit, he bartered it away for gold.
The real merit was over-laden with a thick coat of meretricious glitter.
Attractive and dazzling show was what he set before the light-hearted
public of the French capital, and they mistook the tinsel for pure gold.
But, for all that, Meyerbeer was the hero of the hour, and what was
fashionable in Paris was immediately reproduced in the fatherland towns
and cities. In matters of art Paris was the acknowledged leader of
Germany. From afar, the young ambitious music director of Königsberg
heard of the fabulous sums which Meyerbeer received for his works. He
was in the direst distress. The troubles of Magdeburg had followed him
to his new home, and he looked with longing eyes towards Paris, the El
Dorado of his dreams. He became haunted with visions of luxurious
independence, startling in their contrast to his present penurious
position. He looked about him and bestirred himself. With his accustomed
boldness, not to say audacity, he promptly wrote to Scribe, hoping by
one effort to emerge from all his trouble. What he sent to the famous
French librettist was a plan he had sketched of a grand five-act opera
based on a novel by König, “Die Hohe Braut” (“The Noble Bride”). He was
anxious for the collaboration of Scribe, since in that he saw the _open
sesame_ of the Grand Opera House, Paris. The French writer did not
reply. Wagner felt the slight. This was the second time the assistance
of an acknowledged litterateur had been solicited, and it was the last.
Laube did not satisfy him. Scribe did not notice him. Henceforth he
would rely on himself.
[Sidenote: _THE LOST OVERTURE._]
His stay at Königsberg is marked by an event of peculiar interest to
Englishmen. Wagner had heard “Rule Britannia.” He gave me his
impressions of it. He thought the whole song wonderfully descriptive of
the resolute, self-reliant character of the English people. The opening,
ascending passage, which he vigorously shouted in illustration, was, he
thought, unequalled for fearless assertiveness. The dauntless
expressiveness of its themes seemed admirably adapted for orchestral
treatment, and he therefore wrote an overture upon it. This he sent to
Sir George Smart, one of the most prominent of English musicians, justly
appreciated, among other things, for having introduced Mendelssohn’s
“Elijah” to England at the Liverpool festival of 1836. When Wagner
related this incident to me in 1855, on his visit to London, he said
that, having received no reply, he inquired and ascertained that the
score seemed to have been insufficiently prepaid for transmission, and
that Sir George Smart had refused to pay the balance, “and for all I
know,” continued Wagner, “it must still be lying in the dead-letter
office.”
A digest of Wagner’s impressions of the world beyond the footlights,
after his intimate connection with the provincial theatres of Würzburg,
Magdeburg, and Königsberg, will explain how so serious a thinker could
adapt himself to the slipshod existence of thoughtless, light-hearted
play-actors. Among modern stage reformers Richard Wagner stands in the
front rank. He was earnest. He was practical. He had experienced all
evils arising from the shortcomings of the theatre, and he knew where to
place his finger on the plague spot. His drawings and prescriptions were
those of the practical worker; and he was enabled to make them so
through the knowledge acquired during his early life behind the scenes.
What a curious medley stage life introduces one to! “My first contact
with the theatre seems like the fantastic recollection of a masked
ball,” was Wagner’s vivid description of his early stage experiences.
The stage in Germany has too frequently, for the advance of dramatic
art, been the last resort for gaining a livelihood. People of all ranks,
highly educated, or with no more than the thinnest smattering of
education, as soon as they find themselves without the means of
existence, fly to the stage. To one individual endowed by nature for the
histrionic vocation who thus adopts the profession, there are ten with
absolutely no gifts and whose appearance is due to failure in other
walks of life, or to want. All this motley group is, by the restricted
stage precincts, brought _nolens volens_ into daily contact and cannot
avoid constantly elbowing each other. Their private affairs, their
friendships, are an open secret. A special jargon is current coin among
them. Cant phrases abound and their very occupation familiarizes them
with sententious quotations on almost every subject. In no profession is
there such an ardent catering for momentary praise. It is the food, the
absolute nourishment of the actor; hence jealousy and envy exist
stronger here than anywhere else, and Byron does not exaggerate when he
speaks of “hate found only on the stage!”
[Sidenote: _READS BULWER’S “RIENZI.”_]
To Wagner’s impressionable and pageant-loving nature, the stage
possessed fascinating attractions. The free and easy intercourse that
existed between all the members of the company, actors, singers, and
orchestral performers, the existence of a sort of masonic equality, and
the general light-hearted exterior, was in accordance with the jocular
temperament of the chorus master. He was familiarly joking and laughing
with all his surroundings, a habit he retained to the day of his death.
His self-esteem would at all times insist on a certain deference to his
opinion, nor would he brook with equanimity any infraction of his ruling
as music director. From the age of twenty, when he first ruled the
chorus girls at Würzburg, down to the Bayreuth rehearsals for
“Parsifal,” at which he would illustrate his intention by gesture,
speech, and song, he was eminently the commander of his company. His
lively temperament, his love of fun, and remarkable mimetic gifts made
him a general favourite. In the supervision of operas, musically
distasteful to him, he was earnest and energetic, attending to detail
and appropriate gesture in a manner that demanded the respectful
admiration of all under his bâton. Respect and submission to his rule he
exacted as due to his office, and he rarely had difficulty in securing
it.
From Königsberg he paid a flying visit to Dresden, the city of his
school-boy days. With his accustomed omnivorous reading, scanning every
book within reach, he fell upon Bulwer Lytton’s “Rienzi.” Here was a
subject inviting treatment on a large scale. Here was a hero of the
style of William Tell and Masaniello. The spirit was revolution and
moral regeneration of the people. It was a happy chance which led him to
this story, the sentiment of which harmonized so perfectly with his own
aspirations. Visions of Paris and its grand opera house had never left
him. “Rienzi” offered the very situations calculated to impress an
audience accustomed to the gorgeous splendour of the grand opera.
Although his eyes were turned towards the French capital, and his
immediate hope the conquest of the Parisians, it was not his sole nor
ultimate desire. Paris was a means only. He saw that Paris governed
German art, and he felt that only through Paris lay his hope of success
in his fatherland. It was while under such influences that he began to
formulate “Rienzi.”
His stay in Königsberg was cut short owing to the company becoming
bankrupt. This was the second experience of the kind he had met with in
the provinces, and it helped to intensify his contempt for stage life.
He was again in money troubles. Fortunately, his old friend Dorn was
well placed at Riga and able to secure for him the post of conductor of
the opera there. The company was a good one, and its director, Hotter,
an intelligent and well-known playwright, who understood Wagner’s
artistic ambition. The young conductor was very exacting in his demands
at rehearsals. To appeal to him was useless. He was earnest and
inflexible. And yet, notwithstanding his earnestness and the trouble he
took in producing uncongenial operas, he became weary of their flimsy
material. Within him the sap of the future music-drama was beginning to
rise. His own genius and artistic tendencies were in conflict with what
was enacted before him. It was the difference between simulated and real
feeling. What he was forced to conduct was stage sentiment, what he
yearned for was life-blood. And this latter he strove to infuse into his
“Rienzi,” which was now assuming definite shape, words and part of the
music being written.
[Sidenote: _STARTS FOR PARIS._]
When two acts were finished to his satisfaction, there was no longer any
peace for him. Paris was the only fitting place where it could be
adequately represented. But how to get to Paris? At Riga, as elsewhere,
he lived beyond his means. I have before remarked on his incapability of
controlling his expenses and living within a fixed income. Minna was
thrifty and anxious, but her will was not strong enough to restrain her
self-willed husband. She was in a constant state of nervous worry, but
her devotion to Wagner prevented her making serious resistance. Now
funds were wanting for the projected Paris trip, he had none. However,
such a trivial item was not likely to thwart his ambition and to stand
in his way. He borrowed again. He was without any letters of
recommendation to Paris, spoke but very little French, and yet was full
of buoyancy and hope of the success that awaited him when there. It was
a bold, not to say reckless, venture. But it is characteristic of
Wagner. At all great junctures of his life he risked the whole of his
stakes on one card. His determination to leave Riga, and to turn his
back on the irritating miseries of a provincial theatre, led him to
embark with his wife and an enormous dog, in a small merchant vessel
_Pillau_ for London. Totally unprovided with any convenience for
passengers, badly provisioned and undermanned, the frail trading-craft
took the surprisingly long period of three weeks and a half to reach
London. It encountered severe weather and on two occasions narrowly
escaped foundering. The three passengers, Richard Wagner, his wife, and
dog, were miserably ill. On one occasion the bark was driven into a
Norwegian fiord; the crew and its passengers--there were no others on
board beside the Wagner trio--landed at a point where an old mill stood.
The poor wretches, snatched from the jaws of death, were hospitably
received by the owner, a poor man. He produced his only bottle of rum
and struck joy into all their hearts by brewing a bowl of punch. It was
evidently appreciated by the hapless ship’s company, as Wagner was
hilarious when he spoke of what he humorously called his “Adventures at
the Champagne Mill.” When the weather had cleared sufficiently the ship
set sail for London and arrived without any further mishap.