Cosima's Diaries

Wednesday, February 1:

Weather somewhat dull; we are told that February here is stormy and cold. Bonichen is doing much shopping in connection with the move, and Lusch is telling us a lot about my poor father! We spend the evening at Countess Tasca's, where quite a large reception is being held; R. bears it all very well; he even gives some advice to the young lady who sings Dors, mon enfant and Mignonne, and she heeds it well when singing them again.

Thursday, February 2:

Candlemas, moving today, packing amid many difficulties; it is reported that some English people in San Martino have been set upon and robbed, and we are advised to notify the prefect of our moving. Our final lunch goes off merrily, though what Lusch has told me about my father's condition and the torments he is having to undergo leaves me in a melancholy mood; he is being told that R. and I are complaining about his visits to us and that with R. he is exposed to ridicule! When I am alone with R. after lunch, I have to shed some bitter tears. A man of such talents and a life so miserably squandered, as if in the clutches of an evil witch! While we are talking with R. about it, we suddenly realize to what an extent his gift of virtuosity has condemned him to worldliness, and this is the dismal explanation for the whole thing. We resolve, when the moment seems right, to make a final onslaught on him, in an attempt to persuade him to make a complete break and remain with us.

I ask Lusch not to relate anything more of what she has heard about the people close to us, in order to spare the other children and allow them to keep their youthful bloom. We leave the room, remembering that here Parsifal was completed. R. says, “We are a large and very good family,” and in a rough wind we enter the carriage. “What will you pay me for leaving?” R. asks Herr Ragusa, who replies, “I'll pay you something to stay on.” Arrival at 3 o'clock, much confusion! But in the end a merry supper and a merry evening, for which Rub. joins us. A Fra Diavolo mood, since we are advised to keep our shutters in good order, but splendid moonlight. R. sends a copy of the Italian piano score to Prince Gangi with a little dedication. Downstairs in the salon, we recall the songs sung yesterday, and R. describes his move to the Rue de la Tonnellerie. The minuet from Mozart's E-flat Major Symph. was played yesterday on two pianos.

Friday, February 3:

A restful night for R.; for all of us somewhat wild and frosty; mine was split up into various acts. Luckily the sun is shining, but it is very cold! R. drives into town to pick out carpets while we arrange the furniture. The children go off at once on a walk. Our lunch is a cozy one; we drink to Lusch's health; R. does it first in German, solemnly welcoming her return, then Fidi in Sicilian dialect!

After lunch R. takes a long rest, but on waking he feels very hot, and the simultaneous arrival of paper hangers, piano tuner, and Count Tasca upsets him greatly. The Count himself is anxious when he learns that the girls have gone off to the left for a walk without being accompanied, and, after sending the facchino [carrier] away, he sets out on foot to meet them. Once R. has calmed down, we also drive toward them, meeting the Count first and then the children, accompanied by Antonio with a powerful shotgun on his back! Much amusement. We divide ourselves between the two carriages and then drive through the enchanting countryside via Madonna della Grazia, returning home through the town.

The evening passes very harmoniously; R. enlarges upon the German language, regretting the loss of so many of its forms. Then he goes on to Herr Turk about the foolishness of philologists, who devote all their energies to establishing the purity of the text and do not bother at all about its spirit. Despite the unfamiliar surroundings our mood is a very good one; I feel as if I have just arrived in Transvaal or been born here! And R. shares my feelings; he also talked about Kant's theory of earthquakes and described it to us, and, after drawing our attention before supper to the magnificent rising moon, he takes me onto his terrace in the evening to admire the splendid moonlight.

Saturday, February 4:

A good night for R., but the cold is severe. However, we are cheerful in the morning, and our conversation soon takes off on a wide-ranging flight; the French Revolution, the terrible fact that now property is all that matters, Rousseau, and many other things enliven us as a brilliant sun shines down. At 12 o'clock we stroll with R. to the Villa Camastra and return home very pleased with Nature, but amused by our escort of two security guards, lent to us by an anxious Count Tasca!

In the afternoon I pay some calls with Lusch, and when I return home, I see R. returning from Camastra, still flanked by his two guards, and now very annoyed by it all. To conclude our outing I had decided to visit our owl with Lusch; we looked for it, could not find it, and were told that the fine bird is now dead. “He must have been pining for us,” R. says at first on hearing about it; then we tell ourselves how miserable the beautiful creature must have been in captivity. Fidi has a slight chill, I put him to bed right away.

The evening passes harmoniously; with the children we look at etchings of German history, and I even read aloud [Friedrich Wilhelm III's] “Call to My People”; but we are beset by uneasy feelings of having been rash in moving here, and I go to bed in a state of indescribable anxiety about R. At my recommendation R. has begun to read [George Sand's] Le Piccinino, after Count Tasca has told us the most curious stories about Valvo the bandit, and the visit paid him in the country by seven bandits, things which make the way in which we are guarded here understandable!

Sunday, February 5:

Worry! I send to Dr. Berlin to ask whether it is advisable to stay on here. The sun is shining, and we wait for Count Tasca, an outing having been arranged; he does not arrive, R. and I drive to his house, it was a misunderstanding. Above all R. wants the bodyguard removed! After lunch the children go with the Count to the flower throwing, R. rests but feels oppressed. Dr. Berlin advises stoves. The children return home with the Count and Rub.

R. asks the latter to play Chopin's “Polonaise” to warm us up and is delighted with it, calling it a masterpiece. He is again delighted by the “flashing of countless spurs,” and explains this to Tasca. In the evening we read “Correa” again in honor of Lusch, with renewed enjoyment. In addition R. is reading Le Piccinino, which he finds pleasing. R. praises my cheerfulness under such conditions, thinks it must be the South; “I know otherwise!” I must add that R.'s first dream in this house concerned Fidi: R. was with somebody like Math. Maier, and through a kind of embarrassment tried on his hat; whereupon Fidi presented him with a small one: “Here, Papa.”

Monday, February 6:

R. is unwell! Probably a cold; a stove is brought in, and it helps a little. He remains all day in his room reading Le Piccinino, which interests him in spite of its “sloppiness”; he remarks that the French cannot make anyone except modern characters speak convincingly. I purchase carpets in town, eat with the children, and in the evening put my Siegfried to bed with a temperature! ... I read Keller's Die arme Baronin to the girls, then go at half past nine to R., whose condition is at any rate no worse. He is very kind to me, calls me goodness and beauty personified, and if that delights me even more unutterably than usual, it is because I see it as a sign of recovery.

The unfamiliar Italian style of furniture causes us to reflect that, in places where people are easily accessible, there is much less comfort; comfort is the invention of the English, with their “I am no slave” attitude. We also come to realize why intellectual work is impossible in such circumstances; it makes me laugh heartily when R. says everything ends in noise, for our hospitable prince always gives his orders with extraordinary loudness and breadth.

Tuesday, February 7:

But R. has a restless night; he wakes up, continually pursued by dreams of my turning away from him in contempt! In the morning he blames it on his temperament, saying that anyone who puts his trust in it is exposed to continual wild-goose chases; he recalls our flight from Naples and now, on leaving the hotel.

I start the day hopefully, since at any rate things seem no worse, either with him or with Fidi; and, since it is Saint Richard's Day, I present him with Humboldt's Kawi-Sprache, which he finds amusing. He eats alone upstairs, while downstairs we celebrate Rub.'s birthday in spite of the inhospitable circumstances. The doctor visits Fidi, who still has a temperature. The doctor seems unperturbed but wants to wait until tomorrow to make up his mind. I had not told R. that the boy was in bed, but he unexpectedly comes downstairs to look for me and finds the doctor and me with Siegfried. Yesterday I was again struck by his uncanny powers of divination: I had scarcely put Siegfried to bed when he said, “Nothing will happen to Siegfried - he always has his mouth open!” It costs an effort to keep the worst thoughts away from R.

He has supper with us; Fidi, on a strict diet, falls asleep! Downstairs we attempt to read Alexis's Ist die erste Bürgerpflicht, but the vulgarity puts us off. R. goes up to his room and continues with Le Piccinino, remarking jokingly that in women's books it is always women who play the dominant role. The novel interests him, even though he recognizes its weaknesses - trivial subsidiary characters described in detail, impossible conversations. When I go into R.'s room in the evening and find it comfortably warm and nicely furnished I tell him that every time I come to him I feel as if I am entering harbor; it is a reflection in miniature of my fate, although outsiders probably imagine life with him is all misery and unrest, as it indeed might appear from the outside. He regrets that I have not furnished my own rooms like his, so that he could come to me in the same way, but he understands when I explain to him that I have no life of my own, and the children and everyone else in the house must be allowed to keep their share of me.

Wednesday, February 8:

R. had a good night, but his cough is very persistent. He is in quite good spirits; lying in bed, he is overcome by the thought of how beautiful it is in music when one instrument joins in with another; one frequently has to deny oneself something, he says, in order to achieve a climax or to ensure that a new theme makes maximum effect; these are things of which people like Marschner and Schumann have no notion. I observe that this is because they probably never saw a melody as a living form, and consequently never felt the need to give it special clothing. He spends the morning quietly reading Le Piccinino. But Fidi's temperature is rising, and when, after a somewhat generous meal (during which R. says he needs only to eat and then he stops coughing), R. meets the doctor and the latter shakes his head dubiously, R. gets into such a state that his spasms return; a short walk with me does nothing to help him, and an anxious evening leads to a wild night for him. (Siegfried's temperature has risen to 40 degrees!) However, amid all this uneasiness and worry we achieve, thanks to the girls, some contentment in the evening; Lusch tells her father about her impressions in Rome, her lunch and dinner with the cardinal, speculations on the stock exchange in which eminent people in Rome participated, producing a “crash” in France, with losses for the small people.

R. says: “With my pessimistic outlook I actually enjoy hearing things like that! Before long not a single honest person will possess a cent. And let us hope there will be no inequality in other things besides property. States will no longer be able to exist - Austria, for instance, which must now go to war, can find no money for it!” When we are talking about the Jesuits, R. asks himself whether this powerful, expert organization could be put to the service of a higher calling; he thinks not, since they would never desist from keeping the people in a state of superstition. The absence of any kind of morality, of God-fearingness - this is what strikes him as typical of the superstition imposed by them. “Excellent fellows here and there who love their master, but not a trace of religion.” Since there is a parade ground in front of the house, we are constantly hearing the blaring of trumpets: “Nobody here but the sons of Nimrod!” jokes R., who finds these childish toy-trumpet sounds quite absurd - he would prefer drums. We draw out the evening, because R. is fearful of going to bed, and talk again about my father; his bewitchment and the possibility of winning him over to us entirely; R. observes that he can easily give up his fortune and everything else, since it is all in the hands of the Princess, and live with us. Our conversation turns into a discussion of women's power over men: “They take hold of them by their vanity,” R. says. And he observes that a better relationship was discovered in the East.

Thursday, February 9:

R. had a wild, agitated night in consequence of an error of diet; Fidi was awake until two o'clock, his fever has abated a little, and he is quiet. R. soon cheers up, too; he talks to me about Lusch's friendly and cheerful character; then an article by Herr Hiller about my father's remarks on the Jews brings us to this subject, and R. says it is becoming more and more clear to him what damage they represent, rather than cause: “In a wound on a poor horse or some other animal one at once sees a swarm of flies.”

While I am with Fidi, he reads Le Piccinino and quotes to me with a smile a description of a fountain in the “nuit parfumée” [“fragrant night”] - there really is a great division between us and the French, he said before reading it to me. But he adds that even such reading is useful; it all helps to sharpen one's basic perceptions: G. Sand did not get beyond the hope that a worker, for example, would one day be ennobled, etc. He is looking forward to the book on the Kawi language; he says this period of mankind interests him - history and civilization are concerned only with killing. He intends to study the book when he writes his preface to Stein. “The character of our present society,” he says, “is easily discernible in the fact that it assumes there is no life after death,” and, in connection with the painter in Te P., he recalls the portraits in Henri II costume, the tight jacket, long legs, cap with a feather, and he says, “I find them repulsive.”

He comes down to lunch and says I must now always put the food on his plate - this would also provide a good excuse in the company of strangers for him always to be sitting next to me. Before lunch he calls me to the window to see the lovely light on the Pellegrino, and yesterday, when we went for a walk despite his spasms, he pointed out Monreale to me, so curiously bathed in rays of light softened by the clouds that it looked “like a mirage.”

In the evening Prince Gangi visits us, bringing jelly for Fidi in his own hands, and since the doctor did not seem dissatisfied with his condition when he spoke to R., we remain downstairs, and a conversation develops about all sorts of things: the popular movement in Sicily in which the Prince, like almost all the aristocracy, took part; then about the stock exchange, and R. demonstrates with great clarity that a profit on the stock exchange can rest only on losses suffered by others. Before that he very splendidly explained Gobineau's system to us, saying that it deals not with l'homme [mankind], but with les hommes [people], and he says he has every reason to be harsh.

Friday, February 10:

Fidi had a restless night, and R. has a slight sore throat, having yesterday, after a walk in the garden, sat down in the salon beside Princess Gangi with a bare head. Our dear son is ill, and the nature of his illness cannot be denied - it is typhoid fever! I stay beside him and go now and again to R. In the afternoon, when the boy has quieted down and I go across to R., I find him reading the dialogue which Stein has sent us, dissatisfied with it and with the whole house, complaining about boredom, about bad country houses; very annoyed at having come to live here. Sorrowfully I leave him after begging him to be a little patient. Whether this irritability is the cause of his illness or the result of it I do not know.

When, in the evening, the doctor prescribes a cold compress to counter the fever, R. flies into a rage about the way the doctor wants this compress applied, and he becomes so violent that the doctor afterward asks me to see that he is no longer present during his visits, since he gets so excited about everything. Since Schnap. has spent two nights beside the sickbed, I take over for tonight the continual moistening of the linen; and our boy has a good night, he quiets down, his breathing becomes more regular, and when he opened his eyes once as I was pouring tepid water, he looked at me and softly cried, “How good!”

At half past two R. appears and is beside himself that I have not asked Schnappauf to relieve me; I have to speak to him vigorously and at length to try to convince him that it is better for our child and for everyone else that I stay with him. R. goes off to bed, and at about a quarter to seven, after Siegfried has slept soundly and well, I lie down beside him.

(R. wrote very frankly today to Count Gobineau, among other things exclaiming with Eteocles, “Oh, Zeus, why did you ever create women?”)

Saturday, February 11:

The doctor says he cannot yet speak definitely of an improvement; we shall have to let the requisite number of days go by. R. has a slight sore throat and keeps to his room, complaining greatly about our stay here. He also does not care for his reading - Stein's dialogues on the Revolution - and he decides not to write a preface, since these pieces seem to him very juvenile. He transfers his attention to Shakespeare and in the evening reads to me the great scene between Beatrice and Benedict, pleased that in it the hollow wit and the cruel cynicism of the princes and counts are emphasized, thus allowing one to feel that Shakespeare took no pleasure in depicting these trivialities, but brought these Renaissance figures back to life only out of his sense of truthfulness. He is extremely delighted with Beatrice's reply to Benedict's desire for no tears, and this “peasant simplicity” enchants him as much as the jesting about eating the sword repels him. He also finds the scene between Leonato and Antonio particularly pleasing.

Telegram from Leipzig about the Ring cycle; R. is pleased with Herr Neumann. Then he talks to me about the Society of Patrons and what he might do to ensure that after our death the cause does not fall into the hands of petty people, hindering Siegfried in all he undertakes. He asks himself whether he will retain enough strength and desire to stage his other works, besides Parsifal, there; he says he ought to take them all up again, with close attention to detail - Tannhäuser, for instance.

In the afternoon, after having lunch alone upstairs (I had mine with the girls), he came down and, finding Loldi alone in the salon, he played to her “her themes” from Frisian, as he told me when I thanked him for the kind greeting I heard as I sat in the sickroom! Today R. complained about no longer having a home anywhere, since Wahnfried has been spoiled for him by so many things. I reply that this is the outward sign of our detachment, and this leads to the subject of “no when or where,” R. full of admiration for the fine way in which Schopenhauer expressed this condition. Regarding our present civilization he exclaims, “It cannot even invent any names” - the name “Emile” put this into his mind. I shall bring the day to an end with the blessing he uttered to me: “Whoever is tended by you cannot die.”

Sunday, February 12:

Fidi had a good night, and the doctor is very satisfied with his condition! R. has a cough, against which he is advised to take opium drops; however great his disgruntlement, his native humor keeps returning, and today, when the doctor was tapping Fidi to sound his swollen spleen, R. asks, “Fidi, do you think the Archbishop would put up with that?” — Yesterday he told the doctor, “Physicians live on our foolish acts.” — Around 12 o’clock I go for a walk with him; the lovely air once again revives his desire to make a second home in Sicily.

At lunch we are struck by coincidence; D[aniela] says Rub. was asking whether R. had received a letter from his father; she says he is disturbed at hearing no news. At this very moment Giovanni comes in with the book containing registered letters, gives it—curiously enough—to Daniela, who signs it for her father and then hands him the letter from Kharkov. — Rub.’s father writes in a very decent manner, and R., sending the letter on to Rub., advises him to do as his father wishes.

He comes to Fidi’s bedside with all kinds of news about the imminent flight of the Pope, the losses in the recent crisis on the stock exchange, which have hit the Jesuits hardest of all; he suddenly finds it cold in the sickroom and says jokingly to S.: “It’s all right for you, you have a temperature, but the rest of us are cold!” — In the evening our excellent friends Gangi and Tasca visit us; unfortunately R. is increasingly annoyed by the necessity of talking French, and by the end of the evening he is feeling very run down.

Monday, February 13:

Fidi was quiet during the night, but very listless during the day. R. had a tolerable night, but he does not feel well; our conversation takes us in many different directions, including Tunis. A (for him) very unwelcome interlude is the visit of our friend Rub., who is quite unwilling to obey his father and yet wants him to go on supporting him financially. At 12 o’clock a drive with R. through the glorious countryside; but R. is displeased by the bareness of the mountains.

Lunch is spent discussing Rub.’s fate. R. is very depressed and out of humor in the afternoon, his revision of the 3rd act gives him no pleasure, and the material difficulties of our life, such as the unsatisfactory furniture, arouse his anger. But in between much laughter (before lunch). I had made inquiries about the owl, in order to have it stuffed as a memento for R. if possible. Then I receive the news that it was not the owl, but Herr Florio’s mother-in-law who had died! Mi dispiace molto, the servant said in conveying this correction! — But the merriment does not last long. Since R. did not feel the worry about Fidi to the same extent, his joy over his improving condition is not sufficiently intense to prevent his disregarding the natural weakness of our child and loudly complaining that the conclusion of our stay here has been spoiled, since we shall be unable to make any excursions.

In the evening, as we are going to bed, he breaks out into complaints about life, the world, and above all the state of his health. But he soon goes to sleep, while I lie awake enduring an inner raging of the most bitter melancholy! But the storm abates, and with the cry “My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” I once again discover the paths my weakness had barred to me, and, sadly still, yet peacefully, I embark on

Tuesday, February 14:

After hearing that Fidi had a good night and seeing R. sleep through it, with only a few short interruptions. He is still coughing a lot, though more loosely.

At 12 o’clock we drive to Madonna della Grazia and return home via the town; the weather is glorious, though the sun burns somewhat. We make the trip in silence. R. enjoys the entrance into the town, its remarkable contours. Our lunch is a very happy one, and R. is again thinking of building a house here.

The doctor, who found Fidi with a temperature of 39 degrees in the evening, is not dissatisfied, however, and, after examining R., he can find nothing to cause alarm, though he admits that his condition must cause him great discomfort. And that is indeed present to a high degree; when friend Rub. visits us in the evening, R. surrenders entirely to his feelings of irritation, and when our normally dear friends Tasca and Gangi appear, he withdraws entirely. The piano score is also annoying him, and the pleasant things which also exist here amid all our sorrows have only a weak effect on him.

Wednesday, February 15:

R. had a tolerable night, but is not yet free of his cough. To take his mind off things he reads travel books, and describes Constantinople to me on a drive to Bocca di Falco which he and I take around midday.

At lunch, however, the sudden entrance of Count Tasca embarrasses him so much that he leaves the room congested. In the afternoon he takes a little walk to Camastra while I am with Siegfried. In the evening the doctor tells us it will be a month before S. will be able to move around quite freely.

Rub. visits us in the evening, and R. treats him more gently than he did yesterday, when he told him that friends are people like the Grosses and the mayor, who never think of themselves. — (At lunch yesterday R. said, in connection with Lusch’s journey to Rome, “I am jealous, I cannot bear seeing a person I love being ordered around by other people.”) Today for the first time he again praises the lovely air here. But the ever-increasing expenditure vexes him greatly!

Thursday, February 16:

R. finishes the revision of the piano score and sends it off, complete with title page. Newspaper reports of the way Herr Ragusa took advantage of us cause us some amusement, though he himself is very angry about them. The air is lovely, R. feels its beneficial effect as we stroll in the garden.

In the afternoon he walks to Camastra by himself, returning home rather tired. In the evening he tells us about the soldier who shot some children dead; he is furious about his acquittal and the state of war here. “Orders!” he exclaims.

Then he loses his temper over the way women dress nowadays and their luxury, and, when Count Tasca and the Prince visit us, he feels so worn out that he withdraws.

Friday, February 17:

R. had a restless night, and he feels ill in the morning. I wonder whether my small birthday greetings will please him a little, with two much-corrected poems by Cosima enclosed in honor of Eva’s fifteenth birthday.

At lunch, before he finds them, he is in a friendly mood, and afterward he is kind toward my efforts to celebrate the day. He drives to town in the afternoon and buys a silver necklace for Eva. He is now reading German history; yesterday he spoke at length about fashion during the Thirty Years’ War, saying how absurd it was - people who dressed like that were not, to his mind, human beings.

Today he talked about the bad behavior of the German princes at the time of Napoleon, how poorly Prussia was treated; he says that, if one considers that, one can understand and respect Bismarck. To ensure a good night’s rest he takes a bath, while the girls go off to a ball under Count Tasca’s protection.

Saturday, February 18:

R. had the good night he hoped for, the girls enjoyed themselves, things are going in the right direction for Fidi, and so there would be reason enough for satisfaction. But R.’s mood does not improve, and lunch, along with a discussion with a paper hanger, upsets him extremely.

I sink into sleep, very tired after many sleepless nights. Count Tasca’s visit awakens me, R. comes in, very irritable, saying that strangers always make me wake up. We go for a drive to Parco, through glorious scenery; R. is somber, shut up inside himself, an almond tree offers him its blossom, which Eva, whom we have taken with us, plucks for me. On the homeward journey he reproaches himself, saying he can feel what a burden he must be on those around him.

We succeed in bringing him into a better frame of mind, and since the children go out again, we spend the evening alone in intimate conversation, mostly about Germany and its history.

Sunday, February 19:

R. slept well; in the morning he talks about the German princes with a mixture of gaiety and bitterness, observing that one could say of them what the Saxon mail-coach driver with the Prussian jacket said to the people who mocked him: “These . . . also deserve to be Prussians.”

The departure of Herr Türk, whom we are sending home, gives rise to much merriment, since Siegf., in his concern for economy, looks through Baedeker for all the cheaper hotels. In the morning we stroll in the garden, in the afternoon at Camastra; as we are leaving, we are greeted by a boy who, R. says, might just have been spat out by Mount Etna, and a few steps farther on we meet a beggar who is a complete “Carthaginian,” black and wild; at Camastra the Count introduces his theater manager, who is reputed to have murdered someone, but whose open, cheerful, and energetic face pleases R. greatly.

Monday, February 20:

In the evening I am obliged to go to a ball at Prince Gangi’s, R. insists that I go and looks on as I dress. However, on Monday, February 20, I find him still awake at 4 a.m.! On my departure he had gone straight to bed but was unable to sleep, and so he waited up for me! But he then goes off to sleep, and at around 11 o’clock I describe to him all the little happenings, which appear to amuse him.

When, in the evening, I ask whether the girls might go to Princess Butera’s for the final and most glittering ball, since I had been pressed to send them there with the Tascas, and Blandine in particular was very anxious to go, he flies into a great rage and says that he feels nothing but contempt for a girl who wishes to gad about four nights in a row, and if he were head of the family, he would forbid it. This final remark decides us, but also causes great dismay among the children. Many tears are shed; Lusch behaves splendidly, understanding her father’s and my feelings completely, and that we are of the same opinion, but Loldi is beside herself, while Boni sheds a few silent tears for her lost enjoyment (she has both given and received much pleasure here).

For R. and me also the night is much disturbed, but after shedding hot tears myself, I hear him getting into bed. After a few quiet words he gets up again, goes off to read, comes back, and says, “The Duke of Augustenburg is still laying claim to the throne.” — Gladly would I have laughed at the change of subject, but my strength deserted me; some time later he falls into a half-drowsing state: “Here, take my foot,” I hear him say; I lay mine on his. “Oh, you are good!” he says, and after a tender and silent embrace, I take his hand, and he sinks into a deep sleep.

Tuesday, February 21:

In the morning he tells me that, half asleep, he had really wished to sacrifice his foot as a penance, like the fakir, and when I touched him, he had felt comforted - that was what he meant by “you are good.” We merrily welcome Lusch, the “angel of death,” and then, with a joyful shock, Siegfried, who, allowed up for an hour, comes to greet us!

As we are having breakfast in bed, we decide merrily that, as far as peace and quiet are concerned, the children might just as well have danced the whole night through. The problem of the Society of Patrons is discussed, the Flatter, the legacy of the festivals as a whole - whether we should let it all die, or retain certain things and try to introduce others. R. regrets feeling so little inclination for anything. It is cold, with snow and hailstorms. R. does not go out.

In the evening we are visited by Count T., Rub., and C[hevalier] Guccia; Rub. plays the King’s March to R.’s satisfaction, he is pleased with the way the work flows. At lunch we talked about Berlioz, his restless rhythms, his embarrassing and inartistic realism (such as the oft-repeated murmuring of the pilgrims in the Pilgrims’ March), his fragmentary themes; R. cites my father’s melody for “Die Lorelei” as being legendary and folklike, then jokes about Schumann’s Weltschmerz, this continual taking up and hurling of Jove’s arrows.

The Bayr. Blätter arrives, and R. finds Wolz.’s article good; but he objects to the announcement of a vegetarian menu. (In the evening Rub. also played the Prelude to Die Meistersinger and the conclusion of Tristan und Isolde, but R. is not satisfied with this - he says the whole secret of it is that the tempo should be literally suspended in the interest of spiritual freedom.) When he wonders what it is about these things which pleases our Sicilians, I suggest the pulsing life within them, and he thinks I am right.

Wednesday, February 22:

R. had a tolerable night; he has a sponge bath in the morning and feels very run down after it. An article on Cherubini by Dr. Schemann, which he reads (in the Bayr. Blätter), vexes him, and he writes ironically to Wolz. about the various tragedies: of Schumann, to have possessed no melodies; of Rossini, to have had no school; of Brahms, to be a bore, etc. That relieves him. He is much amused by a reply made by Frederick the Great to a clergyman.

The weather is fine but fresh, and he just walks to and fro in the little garden. We spend a peaceful evening chatting. I hardly dare to say it, but things seem to me to be taking a turn for the better. The distribution of roles among the singers is keeping R. much occupied; he fears there will be disputes about precedence, and that they will all want to take part in the first performance. I, on the other hand, believe that they will all behave well.

Thursday, February 23:

R. slept well, and in the morning his conversation in bed takes the form of meditations on the world, on Gobineau’s theories; he believes in a catastrophe which will open the door to migrations and the establishment of communities in Southern countries. Yesterday he talked about the English, saying that the expression “a nation of shopkeepers,” however curious it may sound when one considers all the elegant lords, is nevertheless quite correct, since they rule other peoples only in order to safeguard their property in England.

The air is splendid, R. enjoys it. We go to Camastra for a walk; the purity of the air, the sharp outlines of the mountains, the blue sea in the distance enchant us.

His reading is now to be Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons (since he is saving Die Kam-Sprache for serious study, along with the Gobineau book, for when he starts to work out his Male and Female). But he is approaching it with trepidation, having seen Schopenhauer described in Mérimée’s preface as the father of the nihilistic movement; R. observes that no other nation is as stupid as the French, he finds them more and more repellent. All the same quotations in the Bayr. Blätter from [Diderot’s] Le Neveu de Rameau please him greatly, and the statement of Herder with which this article ends he also finds very striking.

In connection with the Blätter we talk about partisanship, and agree that it is not a good thing when insignificant people attempt to meditate about something a man of genius has said. We drive to S. Maria di Gesù, R. pleasantly affected by the beauty of the day and the “magical forms” of the mountains. However, we do not get out, but doze in the carriage outside the churchyard while the children are strolling about. On the drive home R. remarks on the gnarled appearance of the olive tree, how curious it is, as if the tree begrudged growing!

In the evening, talking about our presence here, R. says quite openly, and in contrast to my own feelings, that he has no sense of obligation or gratitude; there are some people he likes, he finds them endearing, and then he takes pleasure in being agreeable to them; but not out of a sense of obligation. Yet only recently he said to me one morning that, by accepting favors from people who did not belong to him, such as Wesendonck, he had laid himself open to embarrassing familiarities.

Much jesting about Schemann’s cypress branches for Cherubini, in whom R. recognizes tremendous talent combined with much dryness. He talks about the beginning of the Fidelio Overture (the first work by Beeth. he ever heard, and it made an overwhelming impression on him!), its courageous honesty, something which nobody could imitate without making it sound at once like an imitation; whereas Rossini could quite easily have used the theme from the Water Carrier Overture in slow tempo in his Fell. For all its guileless prettiness it is just an arabesque, he says. The most striking example of the Beethoven manner, he continues, is the opening of the C Minor Symphony: who could ever imitate that? — He then talks about Jommelli, Durante, and opera arias by these composers which he had heard and which gave him the impression of a grand style.

Friday, February 24:

R. had a good night, but all the same he has a very severe chest spasm. He thinks of Schiller’s sufferings and feels extremely dejected. The day passes in anxiety; we spend the evening upstairs in Fidi’s vicinity. The children chat, and I relate to R. various things from the correspondence between Goethe and Marianne Willemer.

Saturday, February 25:

R. had a good night and is feeling very much better. Telegrams from Herr Neumann about Paris take up his time, but his mind is free enough for him to talk with me about Wilhelm Meister, which I have suggested for evening family reading. He regrets that its noble and humane community emerges with so little clarity, and that one never knows where one is or in which period it all takes place.

He is persistently reading Fathers and Sons, in which he is slightly conscious of routine, but he finds some things in it to praise. At lunch, when in connection with reading we talk about the relationship of young girls to the world, he says in a low, agitated voice, “God, when one sees what society made out of people’s natural urge to approach one another, and with one another to create something beautiful, there is not much one can say about anything else.” Then he mentions Gobineau’s profound remarks about language and how the various races have handled it, and he regrets not being able to be of any use to this outstanding man. Gob.’s reply to his letter shows him that he has stepped right into a puddle.

A visit from Count Basewitz’s family raises the question whether R. should not introduce himself to the Grand Duke’s heir, but R. utterly rejects the idea. We drive out in the direction of Parco and come in splendid weather to the loveliest of localities. When Goethe’s line “When for six stallions I can pay” comes into our minds, R. says, “One always overlooks how terrible that is - when I can pay, then the 24 legs are my own - always property.”

In the evening we chat again; Lusch tells us several things about Rome, but R. feels ill at ease, as usual when the world is being spoken of; Sgambati, whom Lusch praises, is repulsive to him on account of his coldness, and so it is with everything. When he is in bed, he says, “I have you, and otherwise nobody in the whole world; if it were not for you, I should have nothing at all, nothing belongs to me except you.”

Sunday, February 26:

R. was somewhat restless during the night, but in the morning he gaily tells me two dreams he had. The one: “I came home to Minna, who asked whether I had been with Frau Tichatschek; I told her yes, but it had been a party, whereupon she flew into a rage, saying to me as I left, ‘I am going to a hotel to sleep and tomorrow I shall go to a lawyer’; whereupon I said to myself, ‘This must stop,’ and she threw billiard balls after me.” The second: “From the street outside I looked up at your father’s room; there was a piano in the window; nimble as I was, I climbed up and played the Gretchen theme to your father as he returned; he looked up from the street in astonishment; so that he should not know who it was, I tried to go back through the window, but I stumbled, and then woke up.”

The mood today is very good. At 12 o’clock we stroll in the garden with Fidi, and in the afternoon I walk with R. to Camastra, where the red aloes are in flower. Though we often have to sit down, R. is not too worn out. Before that, the appearance of Dr. Berlin with some bottles of beer cheered R. greatly. The great event of the day is the completion of the tent on the terrace, and beneath it we enjoy our coffee and also the beer. The air is wonderful. R. humorously scolds the children, the many “useless girls” who constantly want to be entertained, and in the evening he hospitably receives our good landlords Tasca and Gangi and rails amusingly, if energetically, against Chevalier Guccia’s monocle, recommending that he wear an “honest” pair of spectacles. To the children he says, “Mama and I should by rights no longer be among you, but hovering on clouds up above.” At the conclusion of the evening he gets Rub. to play the Andante from Beethoven’s E-flat Major Quartet and the Scherzo (“butterfly!”) from another. And I thank the dear God who made me a present of this day!

Monday, February 27:

R. slept well, but the weather is wretched, storm and rain; it makes us laugh to think that the tent was erected outside only yesterday! But this morning R. has no chest spasm; he is very careful with his sponge bath and manages thus to stave off an attack. R. begins a letter to the King and writes three pages about Fidi. He, still tired from yesterday, stays in bed and draws; his continued education gives us much to think about, where to find playmates as well as a tutor for him? This occupies R. and me during a drive into town. R. would like to take over Fidi’s history lessons himself, but he complains about always leading such a restless life - now fully taken up, for instance, with his Paris affairs.

In the carriage in town he suddenly calls out, “Very well, you gentlemen overflowing with ideas, try to write a melody like the Prelude to the first act of Tristan und Isolde!” Then some goats claim his attention, and he says, “They have proper Philistine faces, like tailors - a sheep expresses much more suffering.”

In the evening we begin Fathers and Sons with the children; I do the reading. At half past nine we break up, and R. and I spend a long time in his room in intimate conversation, in effusions of love! R. pays tribute to what he calls my courage and my sufferings, and when I tell him that it is only because of him that I was able to do it, he denies that and says no, he is not even permitted to advise me, for in matters of love the woman must take precedence; when I still maintain that it was he inside me and not myself, he exclaims: “Oh, no! To have any sense of himself, a man must be loved - the life-giving power is female. And things began to work again when you were with me - people had been saying that I would never do anything more, and then it all started again. One can live for a while on one’s inner resources, but then one must be shown a picture of oneself in a mirror to know what one really is.”

And he recalls the terrible circumstances in which I showed my belief in him, and also the good King, who stood by us loyally, “and for that reason one can say a few flattering things to him.” And his final words before going off to sleep: “It is now as it was on the first day, only better!”

[Added in margin: “On the drive home he tells me about Carlyle, whose biography he is reading, and he is pleased with the remark that he, Carlyle, vacillated between prophecy and comedy. Then R. expresses his surprise over his taking sides against the Negroes, saying how rarely a person is completely free; he feels that deism, the Jewish kind which inhibited even Goethe, also oppressed Carlyle’s spirit. R. is much amused by C.’s criticism of democratic government, in which he says that most of England’s 30 million inhabitants are blockheads. He describes as an ‘ironic ovation’ the fact that figures from his dramas were used in a masked procession in Leipzig, and that from the pilgrims a ‘Pulcinella and P. Carnival’ arose!”]

Tuesday, February 28:

R. had a good night and is looking very well. But his mood is soon clouded by the vexations which never fail to arrive - the fact, for instance, that the glazier from the town comes in the morning and keeps him from finishing his letter to the King: “It’s always like that,” he declares. Various things in the Carlyle biography occupy his mind, and he tells me what he says about the nobility and about Friedrich Schlegel’s conversion.

We visit, with an eye toward perhaps renting it later, a deserted Palazzo S. Elia, where we are confronted with a most curious set of people! All races seem to be represented in these deserted accommodations - bawling Negroid creatures, as well as genteel, quiet, handsome ones, everywhere children, life, and idleness, an extensive view, terraces and neglect - so remote from all civilization that it makes us laugh. From there we go to Camastra, where every day there is something new in bloom.

We recently talked about the way in which nature poetry seems to be a peculiarly German phenomenon - the Italians, for instance, usually bring it in only in a realistic sense, and then mainly in the form of animals; trees budding, blossoming, and fading, deep shadows, dew - all this seems to affect them hardly at all. R. tells me with some annoyance that the first sight of the Parsifal music the general public has had is in the correspondence columns of a newspaper (concluding bars of the first act). The impatience with which the piano score is being awaited reminds him of his own impatience for the piano score after Weber’s death. General Skobeleff’s statements amuse R., who has no sympathy with the Austrian monarchy, and Turgenev’s story gives us a further lively insight into the Russian character.

But unfortunately the day ends in a regrettable outburst, since the supplement to the B. Flatter - an advertisement for books on vegetarianism, the description of the Flatter itself (“monthly periodical for the propagation of a German culture”) - upsets him extremely. He reflects on how he might put an end to this relationship but cannot make up his mind, since, as he says, it is connected to some extent with the problem of Wolz’s living. I hope I have managed to ensure that he will not write harshly to W. but will effect the dissolution in a friendly spirit, and with his consent.

[Added in margin: “At supper R. expresses his delight in Kietz’s bust of me and says it is the best portrait ever done of me, an excellent likeness, and he is glad it exists.”]