Wednesday, January 1:
Who could describe the feelings with which I wish R. good fortune today, at the conclusion of a year we were permitted to spend entirely at Wahnfried, unseparated, in which Parsifal came nearer to completion and a significant part of R.’s burden was lifted from his shoulders?
Though it was late before he fell asleep, he had a tolerable night. He reads the shorter writings of Plutarch, which friend Wolzogen gave him for Christmas, and is enjoying them. I start to file away the papers for 1878, while the children are dismantling the Christmas tree, and receive calls, one of which, from Dr. Landgraf, gives me much pleasure. He says that R. seemed to him like a god, and none of the many pictures of him he has seen conveys anything of the expression on his face while conducting: his spirit passes into the others like an electric current!
At lunch we talk about the dogma of palingenesis (Loldi said she believed in reincarnation), and R. tells the story of the virtuous prince who was blinded: Buddha explained that he had once blinded antelopes. How beautifully does this relate suffering to justice! And how pitiful, in comparison, our Jewish doctrine of sin! Springlike weather, sunshine, I go out of doors with indescribable emotions, look at the birds in the poultry yard which give R. so much pleasure, particularly the peacock; R. rests for a while, then goes to call on Councilor Kraussold, who does not really understand the purpose of his visit, paid by R. in recognition of the evening of the 25th. Returning home, R. settles down to work on Parsifal! I have told him that I no longer wish to hear any music except Parsifal, played by him.
Before that, returning from his walk, he says to me, “I have been performing rose miracles in your room.” In the morning he placed on my bureau a little bottle of “Extract Richard Wagner,” which he brewed himself, and in the afternoon he pours a few drops of rose essence on my bouquet. In the evening we celebrate the “octave” of the concert with my “white robe” and with memories. Such joys are not ephemeral; my feelings are borne upward to Heaven as if on wings, all earthly things are forgotten, and all that remains in my heart apart from love is the desire to be and to do good.
R. spoke a lot about Beethoven, how rarely he modulates, and how his teacher Weinlig had told him to what great extent his novelty lay in rhythm. Referring to the overture: “The jest of a creator, playing with the world.” Much about the symphony, too. As we part, R. says: “Oh, the way you looked at me that time in Zurich (1858)! I really was like Tristan, so modest; then I was told by K. Ritter that you both wanted to throw yourselves in the lake, and I became totally confused.”
Over our after-lunch coffee he spoke of the dissolute companions with whom he spent his youth, and said it would not be necessary for Fidi to go through that - he has been rescued by the spirit of music, just as he himself, when that took possession of him, was liberated from all vulgarity. After supper I have to write to Paris regarding a dress which took his fancy in the fashion journal; we have to laugh heartily when he says, “If one is wise, one grasps such opportunities.”