Cosima's Diaries

Recordings by Cosima Wagner between 1869 and 1883

Cosima Wagner’s diaries are one of the most extraordinary inner records of nineteenth-century artistic life: part household chronicle, part spiritual notebook, part Bayreuth archive, and part psychological portrait of Wagner’s final years. Across thousands of entries, we see the daily world behind the myth: children, servants, illness, money, visitors, letters, rehearsals, readings, quarrels, weather, politics, music, and moments of almost mystical illumination. The diaries follow Wagner from the intimate Tribschen years through the creation of Bayreuth, the triumph and crisis of the 1876 Ring Festival, the making of Parsifal, the rise and collapse of the Nietzsche relationship, and the darker ideological currents that increasingly gathered around Wahnfried, including Wagner and Cosima’s antisemitism. They are not a neutral record, nor always a comfortable one, but they are indispensable: a vast, intimate, often beautiful, often disturbing window into the household where Wagner’s final works, his self-mythology, and the Bayreuth idea took shape.

The diary entries gathered here cover the years from January 1869 to February 1883, carrying the reader from the last Tribschen years to Wagner’s final days in Venice. Their breadth is astonishing. They are at once a household record, an artistic logbook, a spiritual notebook, a political barometer, and the intimate chronicle of a private circle attempting to become a public institution. Cosima records children’s illnesses, lessons, servants, meals, letters, debts, travel, weather, music-making, rehearsals, guests, books, dreams, religious reflections, and Wagner’s daily moods. The sublime and the administrative are never far apart. A passage on Schopenhauer, Shakespeare, Calderón, Beethoven, or Christ may sit beside anxieties about singers, money, doctors, railway journeys, or household arrangements.

The early years, especially 1869 to 1871, still belong largely to the private world of Tribschen. They are filled with the pressures surrounding Cosima’s separation from Hans von Bülow, her union with Richard Wagner, the birth and childhood of Siegfried, and the intense domestic enclosure in which Wagner’s later work was nurtured. Yet the outside world continually enters: King Ludwig, Munich theatrical politics, the Franco-Prussian War, German nationalism, and the first sustained appearances of Friedrich Nietzsche. Wagner’s work on Siegfried and the wider Ring is recorded not as a distant masterpiece but as something happening in rooms, at the piano, amid children, letters, exhaustion, and sudden exaltation.

From 1871 onward, the diaries begin to turn toward Bayreuth. At first it appears as an idea, almost a visionary solution to the failures of ordinary theatres. Soon it becomes practical reality: sites, architects, patrons, Wagner societies, subscriptions, guarantees, construction, copyists, singers, scenery, and the immense labour of creating a theatre for one artistic purpose. The move to Bayreuth and the building of Wahnfried do not simplify life. They intensify it. The diaries show Bayreuth not merely as a shrine, but as a project beset by money, politics, vanity, devotion, incompetence, faith, and fatigue.

The approach to the 1876 Ring cycle dominates the middle years. The Festival is presented as the culmination of decades of artistic striving, but Cosima’s record makes clear how fragile the whole enterprise was. Every singer, rehearsal, costume, curtain, orchestral problem, and financial arrangement seems capable of threatening the ideal. After the Festival, the tone shifts sharply. The achievement has happened, but its aftermath is troubled by deficit, press hostility, uncertainty about future performances, the proposed Society of Patrons, the founding of the Bayreuther Blätter, and the London concerts undertaken to repair the damage. Bayreuth has succeeded as revelation, but it has also become a burden that must somehow survive in the world.

After 1876, Parsifal gradually becomes the spiritual centre of the diaries. The entries from 1877 to 1882 increasingly revolve around its poem, score, staging, rehearsals, religious atmosphere, and practical realization. The world of the Grail enters the daily life of Wahnfried: Gurnemanz, Kundry, Amfortas, Klingsor, the Flower Maidens, the Temple, the Communion imagery, the question of sacred drama, and the problem of presenting a work that seems to demand reverence from a public theatre. At the same time, Wagner’s health, his travels, his growing weariness, and the family’s movements through Italy and Venice give the later diaries a more autumnal character.

The diaries must also be read with full awareness of their antisemitism. This is not a marginal feature. In the early years, anti-Jewish remarks often cluster around the controversy of Wagner’s Judaism in Music, hostile critics, the press, Meyerbeer, musicians, theatre politics, and questions of assimilation. By the later 1870s and early 1880s, the tone changes. Antisemitism becomes more sweeping, more political, and more programmatic. The entries increasingly connect Jews with finance, journalism, liberalism, modernity, social decay, and Germany’s loss of spiritual identity. The diaries also record Wagner and Cosima reading or discussing figures such as Disraeli, Stoecker, Gobineau, and writings on the so-called Jewish question. By 1881, this hostility has hardened into open sympathy for anti-Jewish agitation and fantasies of expulsion, separation, or emigration. The development is ugly, historically important, and inseparable from the world these diaries disclose.

That ugliness is made more complex, not less, by the fact that Jewish individuals remain present in Wagner’s life and work: friends, patrons, musicians, correspondents, and, most famously in the late Bayreuth circle, Hermann Levi. The diaries therefore reveal not a simple contradiction but a deeper moral failure: Wagner and Cosima could depend on, admire, or work intimately with individual Jews while still interpreting Jewishness itself through hostile and dehumanizing abstractions. Any serious encounter with these diaries must resist both sanitizing this material and reducing the whole archive to it.

The Nietzsche story forms another major arc. In 1869, Nietzsche enters as a brilliant young philologist and soon becomes a cherished visitor, correspondent, and intellectual ally. The early diaries record excitement over his writings, especially the work that would become central to the Wagnerian cause, The Birth of Tragedy. During the Bayreuth years he appears as part of the wider hope for a new German culture, one that might unite art, philosophy, and spiritual renewal. Yet the relationship gradually frays. His ill health, his independence, the influence of Paul Rée, his rejection of Schopenhauer, and the publication of Human, All Too Human transform him in the Wagners’ eyes from disciple into apostate. By the later entries, Nietzsche is remembered with bitterness, as a figure of disappointment, ingratitude, and betrayal.

What makes these diaries invaluable is precisely their mixture of greatness and blindness. They reveal the daily climate in which Wagner’s late works were conceived, defended, mythologized, and institutionalized. They show Bayreuth being born out of metaphysical ambition and practical desperation. They show Parsifal emerging from religious longing, theatrical calculation, bodily decline, and cultural polemic. They show friendship turning into estrangement, devotion turning into dogma, and spiritual aspiration entangled with prejudice. To read Cosima’s diaries is to enter the workshop, chapel, battlefield, and household of Wagner’s final years.

Year

Month

1869• 1870• 1871• 1872• 1873• 1874• 1875• 1876• 1877• 1878• 1879• 1880• 1881• 1882• 1883

Jan• Feb• Mar• Apr• May• Jun• Jul• Aug• Sep• Oct• Nov• Dec

Showing entries for October 1869 (28 total)

Date	Word Count	Subject	Content
October 1, 1869	152	Prince Georg sends another drama, Cosima tends Siegfried, and Richard turns a remark to Fidi into a reflection on wisdom and curiosity. Pasdeloup's gloomy letter about illness and poor business leads to talk of Richard's inability to work in the outside world, where he is misunderstood as merely an opera composer. The possibility of America arises if the King's allowance ends, and Beethoven duets close the uncertain evening.	Friday, October 1: Letter from Prince Georg, sending another drama by himself. Attending to Siegfried. “But, Fidi,” I say, “you would do better to stay here indoors.” “Yes, there speaks the sage,” R. observes, “but the know-it-all was there before the sage, and he wants to get to know everything the sage so regrets knowing.” R. is still not very well. In the evening he brings a letter from Pasdeloup which sounds very gloomy. He is ill and business is not good! We discuss how impossible it is for R. to undertake anything outside. The world is closed to him; all his success still rests on the assumption that he is a composer of operas. But he is not that at all, hence the constant misunderstandings. We discuss the possibility of a journey to America, should the King withdraw his allowance. God knows what the future holds for us. Beethoven quartet as a piano duet.
October 2, 1869	135	A newspaper reports waning demand for Rheingold, but Richard's melancholy lifts enough for him to show Cosima the beginning of the Norns' scene. At lunch he tells her no one has proved courage to him except her, while she answers that she has only love. Claire's sad news about Cosima's mother and evening quartets keep joy and sorrow intertwined.	Saturday, October 2: It says in the newspaper that public demand for Das Rheingold has already begun to fall off! R. in the morning in melancholy mood, but recovered himself in the course of it so much that at midday he could tell me, “I have something for you, something has arrived,” and then he showed me the beginning of the Norns’ scene. At lunch he suddenly says to me: “No one in this world has proved his courage to me except you. People should at least show respect for that.” I have to reply that I never possessed courage, but only love, which I still have. I know, alas, only too well how slight my strength is! In the evening a letter from Claire; always only sad news of my mother. In the evening quartets with R.
October 3, 1869	287	A bad night with Siegfried becomes for Cosima a willing little penance for happiness and guilt, followed by Countess Bassenheim's pleasing visit, family lunch, games, and Schure's arrival. The original row then covers several days with Schure: conversations on Wagner's ancient, temple-like vocation in a modern fairground world, music from Siegfried, walks, readings, Lichtenberg, Judith's letter, Mrazek's expected letter, and restless nights with the baby. Cosima's devotion is renewed through the contrast between Richard's calling and the world's inability to understand it.	Sunday, October 3: A bad night, Siegfried awake every two hours; bore this slight torment with pleasure, how willing I am to suffer in order to earn my happiness and atone for the guilt of my existence! In the morning a visit from Countess Bassenheim, who much to my delight pleases R. greatly with her cordiality and her wit. Lunch with the children, then games with them. Siegfried well again. Wrote a letter to Claire. In the evening arrival of M. Schuré. Monday, October 4: Bad night with Siegfried, and R. still unwell. The expected letter does not arrive from Munich, so we assume the King is after all stopping the allowance. R. speaks to Schuré about our affairs and finds his outlook admirably sound. Botanist. After lunch I talk to Schuré about the whole anomaly of R.’s coming into the world in our days. He should by rights have graced the world in Aeschylus’s age; now, to clear up the insoluble misunderstanding between himself and the world, he relies on occasional explanations, and the more he talks, the wider the gap becomes. The theater of his thinking is a temple and the present theater a fairground stall; he speaks the language of the priest, and shopkeepers are supposed to understand him! I have to dedicate my whole life to him, for I have recognized his position. In the morning he plays parts of the first act of Siegfried. Tuesday and Wednesday, October 5 and 6: Days devoted to our visitor; each morning some music from Siegfried. In the afternoon a walk; in the evening, reading. Have made the acquaintance of Lichtenberg, great delectation. From the outside world a letter from Judith and at last the expected letter from Mrazek. Restless nights with Siegfried.
October 7, 1869	134	Cosima assists Vreneli at the birth of the second Stocker child and is deeply moved by the reality of a creature entering the world. News from Munich brings money from the sale and word that Hans is traveling to Italy, which still makes her tremble. Exhaustion sends her to bed, where Richard reproaches her for neglecting herself, though she insists she must continue tending Siegfried at night.	Thursday, October 7: Birth of the second Stocker child. I assist Vreneli and am terribly moved by the sight of a creature coming into the world. Why are we so badly told in our youth what the world and life are like? Letter from the maid in Munich; I receive some money from the sale and hear that Hans is on his way to Italy. I cannot hear his name mentioned without trembling in my heart. I write to Judith and am afterward so tired that I have to spend the whole day in bed. This greatly affects R., and he reproves me for not sufficiently looking after myself. I should not tend Siegfried during the night, he says, but I feel I must and can do this. Our mood, viewed from without, is a completely hopeless one.
October 8, 1869	118	Cosima spends much of the day with Vreneli and the children while Richard orchestrates a page of Siegfried. Loulou's new birds bring delight, but Richard returns from his walk in a bad mood and challenges Cosima over Claire's letter. Her rare angry impatience at being unjustly questioned leaves her physically shaken and torn apart.	Friday, October 8: Much time with Vreneli, and then with the children. R. orchestrates a page of his Siegfried. After lunch the arrival of the birds he is presenting to Loulou gives us much, much delight. Unfortunately R. returns home from his walk in a bad humor, and in connection with a letter from Claire he calls me to account in a manner which soon arouses angry impatience in me, for I know quite well that I have never failed him in anything and have guarded his honor more jealously than my own. This impatience, so foreign to my nature, upsets me terribly, and as I write this, my whole body is trembling and quaking, and I feel torn to pieces.
October 9, 1869	115	Richard and Cosima reconcile without explanations, recognizing that anything separating them is madness, and both see Claire's marriage-contract advice as the trigger for his irritability. He orchestrates while she works with the children and nurses Fidi, then the children attend Bernhard Stocker's christening while she stays home because church would be improper for her now. Don Quixote closes the evening.	Saturday, October 9: Of course R. realized that he had been unjust to me, and I that his irritability was only the result of the unpleasant impression Claire's letter had made on him; she urges me to be cautious about my marriage contract! We have to fall into each other's arms without explanations, for anything which serves in the least to separate us is nonsense and madness. He does some orchestrating, I work with the children and nurse Fidi. After lunch, christening of the little Bernhard Stocker, the children to the church. I remain at home, for it would not be fitting for me to enter a church just now. In the evening R. reads me Don Quixote.
October 10, 1869	209	A peaceful discussion of Claire's concerns leads Cosima to request recovery of money owed by her mother so it can be insured for the two elder children. A family lunch with christening cake and a walk to the chapel mark a mild farewell to nature's autumn colors. Talk of Schopenhauer, women, Richard's youthful pressures, and Nau's hypocritical public praise of the Munich school colors the day with irritation and insight.	Sunday, October 10: Quiet morning; we discuss peacefully and in detail the question which recently so upset us, and I write to Claire, asking her to attend to my little bit of business, namely to obtain for me the 40,000 francs my mother owes me, so that I can set it aside in an insurance company for the two elder children. Lunch with the children, with a christening cake. Then took a walk with R. to the little chapel; at the same time a farewell to Nature, everything is yellow, the sky overcast, the air, however, mild. We talk about Schopenhauer's rage against the veneration of women, and R. says laughingly that he can just imagine how he felt, with all his youthful passion and the problems occupying him, having to listen to all the intellectual chatter in his mother's home, knowing that his whole fortune was being dissipated on these junkets and he would have to write for money. There is a letter from Nau in the Musikalische Zeitung which displeases R. greatly; he thanks the pupils of the music school and at the same time praises all his fellow teachers, Perfall, etc., though he has repeatedly written here to say that everything is thoroughly wretched and bad. Now in Heaven's name!
October 11, 1869	39	The day is largely taken up with preparations for Lulu's birthday and little else. Telegrams from Herbeck report that Die Meistersinger is advancing energetically in Vienna. Cosima's fatigue is great enough that she sleeps most of the afternoon before Don Quixote in the evening.	Monday, October 11: Nothing to report on this day except preparations for Lulu's birthday. Telegrams from Herbeck that Die Meistersinger is in full swing in Vienna. Still great tiredness; I sleep almost the whole afternoon. In the evening, Don Quixote.
October 12, 1869	91	Lulu's ninth birthday brings a grand presentation of birds, a dress, and other gifts, followed by a children's party with puppet show and dancing. Richard's comments about keeping girls and boys apart sadden Cosima and make her regret the disturbance brought into his house. Hans's failure to send Loulou a greeting adds a deeper melancholy to the festivities.	Tuesday, October 12: Lulu nine years old! Grand presentation of gifts: birds, a dress, all sorts of things; she is overjoyed. Children's party with puppet show (me!) and dancing. R. saddens me by claiming to have established through small, unimportant incidents that it would be better not to bring little girls together with boys. I almost reproach myself for having brought into his house as much disturbance as today, and intend to celebrate future birthdays in a different way. It also makes me melancholy that Hans did not send his child a greeting.
October 13, 1869	41	Cold weather and Fidi's worsening rash leave Cosima despondent. She walks with Lusch to Countess Bassenheim's and returns by moonlight through almost southern coloring. Don Quixote in the evening seems increasingly splendid to both her and Richard.	Wednesday, October 13: Cold, also despondent mood, because Fidi's rash continues to get worse. After lunch, with Lusch on foot to Countess Bassenheim's, also returned home on foot by moonlight. In the evening Don Quixote, which seems to us ever more splendid.
October 14, 1869	102	Heavy rain and a fire frame a day of letters and unwelcome news. Dingelstedt's polished praise for Meistersinger astonishes Richard after the Jewish pamphlet, while Claire reports that Cosima may not recover her small capital. The King's unsuitable Beethoven picture darkens Richard's mood further before another evening with Don Quixote.	Thursday, October 14: Raining heavily; a fire in the fireplace since early morning. R. has received an infinitely polite letter from Dingelstedt, telling him how pleased he is with Die Meistersinger! "It is incredible," R. says, "what such people will swallow, when one thinks of that note in the Jewish pamphlet!" In the afternoon a letter from Claire, saying I shall probably not get my little bit of capital! Arrival of a picture of Beethoven, a present from the King of Bavaria. R. put in a very bad mood by it; first, his behavior, and then this unusable gift. In the evening Don Quixote.
October 15, 1869	151	A bad night with Siegfried is followed by Aunt Isa's letter to Loulou, which both saddens Cosima and delights the child. Cosima spends the day largely with the children while the maids go to the theater, and Richard returns with a Beethoven autograph and a touching tribute from an impoverished former Saxon musician. Schure's letter, however, brings distressing news that Siegfried's christening and legal recognition under Richard's name may be nearly impossible.	Friday, October 15: Wretched night, since Siegfried woke up every two hours. Letter to Loulou from Aunt Isa, which filled me with melancholy, but also pleased me very much, since Loulou is so happy about it. I let her reply to it at once. With the children almost exclusively, since I am sending the two maids to the theater. In the evening R. brings back from his walk a Beethoven autograph, which young Servais has presented to him, and a touching document from a former musician in Saxony, who now for reasons of penury has become a trimmings embroiderer; on this document, surrounded by ivy and laurels, are inscribed all R.'s works up to Judaism in Music. R. is very touched by this. Unfortunately a letter from Schure has deeply upset him. There are great difficulties regarding Siegfried's christening and legalization; indeed it is virtually impossible for R. to give him his name. (Botanist.)
October 16, 1869	400	Siegfried's rash makes for another miserable night and a melancholy household, relieved only by the children's lesson, warm moonlight, and Don Quixote. The evening becomes a rich meditation on Cervantes, Shakespeare, Homer, tragedy, Schiller, Calderon, Hamlet, Sancho, and unconscious genius. Richard sees Don Quixote as elemental and human, with Cervantes creating like nature when he is least self-consciously artistic.	Saturday, October 16: Very wretched night with Siegfried, who is much plagued by his rash. I and R. in very melancholy mood. The children to their lesson. I to meet them. Fine, warm moonlight, the coloring almost southern. In the evening Don Quixote. We see how unsatisfactorily one reads in one's youth and how superficially the second part has been judged. R. says he would like a room expressly devoted to honoring every single genius such as Cervantes. R. remarks how C.'s genius creates exactly like Nature, and he and Shakespeare belong among the poets in whom, as in Homer, one does not notice the art, while, for example, the Greek tragedies, Schiller, Calderon, seem like high priests, constructing their forms, as it were, out of a thought. The figure of Don Q. is a counterpart of Hamlet, he says, in regard to the mixture of the sublime with the ridiculous. And everything always human. In this figure Cervantes has depicted himself; he must often have felt like that in relation to the outside world, and his glorious humanity, e.g., his judgment on the knights of the Court, resembles the manner in which C. himself speaks about the poets of the same period. What is striking about the second part is the development of the characters. Sancho has become a different person, yet remains the same; he has gone on to personify the poet himself. He sees everything, everything interests him. When D. Q. enters Don Diego's house, the writer observes that it was above all the stillness of it which pleased him. At supper we talk about Shakespeare's unknown fate. R. believes that he wrote a good number of his plays after his retirement to Stratford. Concerning Falconbridge and Edmund, those two love children: I say that this cannot be discerned in Edmund, but R. says it can. All regular relationships fall by the wayside; here we see strife between father and daughter and there between father and son, while in him Nature shows its power, having produced this one resolute being. Coming back to D. Q., R. says that Goethe created something similar in Werther, that is to say, a book in which one is not conscious of the art behind it. When Cervantes tries to be an artist, he turns into an academician, conventional; his genius is absolutely unconscious, like an elemental force. Today he said much more in this manner, always divine, unique.
October 17, 1869	54	Lusch writes to her aunt, and a family lunch is followed by a day spent entertaining the children in wretched weather. Cosima is troubled by a dream in which the older children distress her and Hans appears deeply sad. Don Quixote closes a day marked by maternal unease and the sense that she can never return to her former self.	Sunday, October 17: Lusch writes to her aunt; afterward family lunch. Wretched weather, all day keeping the children amused. I had a sad dream that my elder children caused me deep worry and that I saw Hans again, and he was so sad. Never again can I become like that! In the evening, Don Quixote.
October 18, 1869	61	Bad weather keeps the children near the garden while Cosima and Richard think only of their love. Nietzsche writes kindly, the student begins geology with them, and town errands turn comic when Richard and Cosima miss each other. She finally locates him by hearing the Ninth Symphony theme whistled.	Monday, October 18: Again wretched weather, the children in the garden; R. and I thinking only of our love. Letter from Prof. Nietzsche, very nice. After lunch the student, with whom we are starting on some geology. In town we miss R., each running in search of the other; in the end I hear the first theme of the 9th Symphony being whistled.
October 19, 1869	100	Siegfried's rash and sleepless nights worry the household, while Lulu writes Liszt for his birthday and Cosima answers Nietzsche. Richard returns from town despondent over a malicious Kladderadatsch image of the King, and Cosima is too unwell for Don Quixote. A recent album leaf for Servais quietly records Richard's artistic generosity.	Tuesday, October 19: Wretched nights; Siegfried’s rash is worrying us very much. Lulu writes to her grandpapa on his birthday. I reply to Prof. Nietzsche. Visit from Frau Am Rhyn. After lunch very unwell, but with the children to meet R., who returns home from town in very despondent mood, having discovered in Kladderadatsch a terrible picture of the P.C. ing, in which wicked things are suggested of him. I very unwell in the evening, so that we are not capable even of reading Don Quixote. On Sunday R. sent Herr Servais a leaf for his album: concluding canon of Siegfried and Brünnhilde.
October 20, 1869	135	Siegfried's worsening rash and silence about the divorce sorely try Cosima and Richard, who decide to treat the present as the height of happiness rather than wait impatiently on the outside world. Richard worries that Cosima is exhausting herself to purchase happiness through sacrifice. Lusch's lesson, Judith's letter, and Don Quixote's Camacho episode close with Richard reading Cervantes as self-portrait.	Wednesday, October 20: Wretched night, great concern over Siegfried, whose rash gets worse and worse. Worked with the children. R. working on his score. Our patience is being sorely tried by the fact that we hear nothing about the divorce; we decide to regard this present time as the acme of happiness and to await nothing from outside with impatience. R. asks me only not to tire myself out so much with teaching and tending the children. He says he knows I desire to purchase our happiness through self-sacrifice, but this upsets and pains him. In the afternoon with Lusch to her piano lesson at Countess Bassenheim’s. In the evening D. Q., the wedding of Camacho. R. on Cervantes: “Certainly he is depicting himself in D. Q., thus playing around with himself and his fate.” Letter from Judith.
October 21, 1869	31	Siegfried remains ill after a wretched night, while Cosima spends the morning with the children and Richard orchestrates without pleasure. A walk, Loldi trouble, children's tea, and further difficulties with Siegfried make the day narrow and heavy. The entry is brief but saturated with fatigue and care.	Thursday, October 21: Siegfried still unwell; wretched night. Morning with children; R. orchestrating but, he says, without pleasure. After lunch walk with the children, Loldi trouble, children’s tea. In the evening Siegfried trouble.
October 22, 1869	103	On Liszt's birthday, Cosima sends a telegram and enjoys the first good night in a long time after Fidi sleeps through. Richard remains unwell but works, walks, and later plays boisterously with the children. Don Quixote's cave of Montesinos and Swiss excitement over a Jesuit instructional book round out the evening.	Friday, October 22: Father’s birthday; sent him a telegram. First good night for a long time; Fidi slept from 11 to 6. R. unfortunately still rather unwell, but he keeps on working and seeks to help himself over it with a long walk. Much fun with the children in the evening; R. lifts them high into the air, carries them on his back like Henry IV, etc. In the evening Don Quixote, the cave of Montesinos, absolutely splendid. Great excitement in Switzerland over a book by the cantonal president about the instructional book used by the Jesuits in the seminary at Solothurn. It is certainly unbelievable!
October 23, 1869	193	Richard is unwell and Fidi restless, but Cosima takes pleasure in Lulu's quick grasp of world history. Marie Muchanoff reports chaos in Munich, and anonymous news alleges Hans's affair and describes theater disorder, while Berlin Tannhäuser receipts arrive like a gift. A dark walk from Countess Bassenheim's, Richard's dejection at her absence, bathing Fidi, and Don Quixote fill the evening.	Saturday, October 23: R. not well and Fidi again restless. World history with Lulu and pleased how quickly she learns, a gift certainly inherited from her father. Very nice letter from Marie Muchanoff; she says that everything in Munich is in a state of complete confusion, that Wüllner cannot conduct Le Postillon, and so on. R. says jokingly he is glad, for if one had to assume that things are after all going well, that would be too bad. There is talk of closing down the school. In the afternoon with Lusch to Countess B.’s because of the lessons, home on foot late in the evening, when it was very dark. R. in bed, a little dejected at my having been away so long. Three letters came: one from Esser, one from Munich, anonymous, which says that Hans has had an affair with an actress whom he wanted to marry, then about how things look in the Munich theater, the lack of discipline and order. Then in Berlin two performances of Tannhäuser have yielded 200 thalers, “a pure gift,” says R. In the evening R. gets up again, I bathe our little boy, then we read Don Quixote.
October 24, 1869	150	Prince Georg asks for an opinion on his plays, putting Cosima in an awkward position, while Richard receives impractical advice from Avenarius to publish his works at his own expense. Richard reflects that the difficulties may help him decide what form such an edition should take, since he has never been an author in the ordinary sense. A walk with the children, family meals, exhaustion, games, and Don Quixote complete the day.	Sunday, October 24: Letter from Prince Georg, who asks for an opinion on his plays, very embarrassing. Fine weather, I go for a walk with the children, to Frau Am Rhyn’s. R. has a letter from his brother-in-law Avenarius, to whom he had gone for advice about the publication of his works. Avenarius advises him to publish them at his own expense! After laughing about this, R. says it is probably a good thing that difficulties are placed in his way, for he still does not know in what form he should bring out this edition, what he should leave out, and whether it should all be done simply as a supplement to the biography; for an author in the true sense of the word he has never been. Ate with the children. Afterward a long sleep, since truly overtired after a sleepless night. In the evening children’s games and later D. Quixote.
October 25, 1869	553	The King's letter combines rapturous love with a plea for pardon over Rheingold, only to be undercut by news that Walküre is being prepared in Munich. Richard concludes that the King cannot kill the work unless he himself breaks and leaves it unfinished, though answering the King remains difficult. The long day moves through winter preparations, letters from Hallwachs, Richter, and Schure, discussion of French Catholic education, cultural progress, music's modern role, and disappointment in Don Quixote's masquerade.	Monday, October 25: R. comes to breakfast with a letter from the King. All the old expressions of love and rapture, and with them a plea for pardon concerning his behavior over Das Rheingold (“my longing was too great”). Then we read in the Signale that Die Walküre is being prepared in the Munich Court theater; so much for the letter: it really is terrible! But we agree that R. is in fact living on his Nibelungen, he owes his existence to them, and so one really ought to thank God that a being such as the King has such curious fads in his head and truly wants to see and have the things, though indeed without being able to appreciate their sublimities. R. says: “He cannot kill the work, I am the only one who can kill it, by breaking with him and not completing it. The fact that he is ruining things now will not detract from the impression when they are one day presented in the way I want, for people still have me to thank for Tannhäuser and Lohengrin. This great presentation does, however, depend in a general sense on cultural conditions, and if these are not achieved, not even the most consummate performances in Munich would be of any avail. All this is in the hands of Fate. But to reply to all the King’s enthusiastic assurances is difficult.” When I ask him whether he intends to go to Vienna for the production of Die Meistersinger he says no: “It is better thus; when I intervene in anything, some demonic urge always arises and puts things in jeopardy. In this way it will simply be a bad theatrical performance, which will pass, as all bad things pass.” Put away the summer things and brought out the winter things; the cold is already with us, and children’s coughs, too, unfortunately. In the afternoon the student for geology. R. comes home with letters: (1) Hallwachs writes that our case might well take six months. (2) Richter, who announces that he has been invited to Brussels to conduct Lohengrin. (3) Schuré, who simply addresses us as a good and loyal friend. I said to R. that it would be a good thing if our Mendès’s friends could learn something from Schuré in this regard. “Unfortunately,” says R., “no development is possible in French people, there is at best only an inspired intuition; for the whole nation has virtually collapsed under the rule of the Jesuits, and their upbringing deprives them of all independent spirit.” He then considers how Protestantism could by itself have saved France, and how the terrible disciplined schooling at all levels can only breed cynicism. In the evening he discusses with me the question of human progress, which has not changed in character; its essence remains the same. What we have lost in productivity, thereby giving our age the appearance of falling into decadence, is made up for by a wider distribution of culture. It is true that in this distribution art is losing a very great deal, but who can measure how gradually the level is rising? Music has now taken the place of the Renaissance arts. In the evening D. Quixote; unfortunately the devil’s masquerade, which has little appeal for us, since we find its purport and the pedantic manner of conveying it downright embarrassing.
October 26, 1869	73	Richard is distressed over how to answer the King's letter, unsure whether seriousness, indirection, or silence is best. Children's coughs overshadow the day, and the Don Quixote masquerade continues to disappoint them deeply. A letter from Doris Brockhaus offers the happier prospect of obtaining Uncle Adolph Wagner's picture.	Tuesday, October 26: R.’s great distress in regard to the King’s letter; how to reply, earnestly or circuitously, or keep completely silent? The day overshadowed by children’s coughs. In the evening great sorrow concerning D. Quixote. The masquerade is intolerable, and this makes us very sad. Much pleasure, on the other hand, caused by a letter from Doris Brockhaus, who tells me I shall probably be able to obtain the picture of Uncle Adolph Wagner.
October 27, 1869	96	Cosima teaches Boni and Loulou while drafting Prince Georg's requested review, and Richard orchestrates despite poor health. Cornelius writes of wanting to leave Munich because open hostilities against Wagner continue there. An evening at Laube's Die bosen Zungen with Countess Bassenheim horrifies Cosima, and Richard concludes that the age understands only newspaper gossip.	Wednesday, October 27: With the children, gave Boni and Loulou lessons, at the same time drafted for Prince Georg the wished-for review. Richard orchestrating. He is unfortunately still not well. In the afternoon a letter from P. Cornelius; he is intent on leaving Munich, because open hostilities are being waged there against R. In the evening to the theater with Countess Bassenheim: Die bösen Zungen by Laube, a famous play of the “present age.” We are quite horrified and do not stay to the end. As R. says, people understand nothing but newspaper gossip; that is their whole world!
October 28, 1869	144	Fidi's eight-hour sleep gives Cosima a rare good night, though Claire reports she will not receive her small capital. With Loulou in bed, Cosima writes Marie Muchanoff, while Richard rejoices in the house, seclusion, and even the expressive moaning of the fire. Fidi's improvement, Richard's play with him, and Don Quixote's instructions to Sancho bring evening gladness.	Thursday, October 28: A good night; Fidi slept for eight hours straight. Yesterday another letter from Claire, who tells me I shall not receive my bit of capital. Loulou in bed; I write to Marie Muchanoff, sitting beside her. At lunch R. speaks of his pleasure in the house and our seclusion. “This is what I always wished for, and yet in wishing for it I always asked myself what I would get from it; I would be as alone here as anywhere else.” The moaning of the open fire delights him. “Everything is contained in this moaning: the sound of ships at sea, a popular uprising, the rolling of carriage wheels, everything.” In the evening R. plays with Fidi for half an hour quite alone. Great gladness that he is getting better. In the evening more enjoyment with Don Quixote. Q.’s instructions to Sancho Panza wonderful.
October 29, 1869	330	Hallwachs reports that the first legal deed in the divorce is on its way, while snow outside contrasts with brightness indoors. Richard delights in Uncle Adolph's Erasmus book, Cosima is shaken by Cervantes's life, and Hermine's pious letter prompts sorrow over religion in the hands of exploiters. Pecht's defense of Semper, Richard's fall from a ladder, memories of alternate pasts, and Cosima's secret birthday plan for Richard fill a long reflective day.	Friday, October 29: Letter from Dr. Hallwachs; the first legal deed concerning our divorce is on its way. With the children; wrote to Judith Mendès. Thick snow outside, much brightness indoors. R. is very delighted with his uncle’s book on Erasmus. What a pleasant, warm tone literature possessed in those times, he says; so much youthful enthusiasm! I read by myself about Cervantes’s life and am so terribly affected by his fate that in the evening I can scarcely take delight in his work, which is again splendid: the governorship and episode with Dulcinea. Yesterday, when I glanced at a religiously inclined letter from Hermine, it made me truly melancholy to see to what extent the eternal and so deeply moving teachings of Christ have fallen into the hands of the exploiters. They haggle with the crucifix and eternally put the unsewn garment of the simple teaching up for auction. My thoroughly religious nature cannot do without the teaching, but cannot bear the manner in which it is conveyed! R. reads me from the A.A.Z. some very excellent sentences written by the painter Pecht about the unworthy treatment of Semper in Saxony; this cry of indignation amidst the general indifference pleases me so much that I write Pecht a word of acknowledgment, but expect from him either no reply or an irrelevant one. Great fright over R.’s fall from the ladder while arranging his library. At supper we discuss various matters from earlier days. “What would have happened if I had gone to live in Berlin at that time, as I wanted to?” “Who can say?” “Oh, it is inevitable that we, after being together for only a few hours, should have felt we could not do without each other,” says R. I stay up late and consider until midnight how I might give R., on his birthday, a sign of what he means to me, to the world. R. asks what I am thinking of all by myself. “You will know in eight months’ time!”
October 30, 1869	111	Cosima writes Claire while still thinking of Cervantes's life and connecting his fate with Richard's. She imagines Hans as perhaps the only one who could share her sense of what such beings mean to the world, though his willingness to suffer for Richard must remain unspoken. A town outing with two children and Don Quixote accompany Richard's declaration that he is nothing but concern for her and their little world.	Saturday, October 30: Wrote to Claire while with the children; still thinking of Cervantes’s life, always in connection with R.’s fate. Perhaps Hans is the only person who shares the feelings which move me when I consider what such beings mean to the world and the world to them. I am certain he is willing to suffer for R.’s sake, but he cannot admit it to himself, and it all has to remain unspoken. How often my thoughts linger with the poor man! In the afternoon to town with two of the children. In the evening Don Quixote. R. tells me today, “I am nothing but concern for you and our little world.”
October 31, 1869	123	Cosima stays in bed with pain and Gibbon while Richard writes down his views on conducting. Family lunch, Countess Bassenheim's visit, Fidi's improvement, and the dazzling landscape of green trees, snow, sun, and rosy mountains brighten the day. She hides Cervantes's life from Richard to preserve a gift plan, but the evening brings Richard's illness and Fidi's rash again.	Sunday, October 31: In bed, much pain; read Gibbon. R. writing down his views on conducting. Family lunch; on leaving, R. looks Eva long in the eye: “What is individuality? Nothing; one sees that when one looks at such a child’s face, and a whole species answers.” Visit from Countess Bassenheim. Fidi in better health, which makes me very glad. I forbid R. to read the life of Cervantes, because I do not wish him to read about the portrait of Cervantes, an engraving of which I am trying to get. Wonderful out of doors: trees still green, the plane on the terrace, with snow, sunshine, and the radiant, rosy tints of the mountains. In the evening R. unwell, and Fidi again afflicted with his rash.
No diary entries found.