Dearest Liszt,
I herewith send you the promised directions for the performance of Lohengrin. Pardon me if they come too late. I heard only recently with what amiable and speedy readiness you have complied with my wish for the performance of this opera. When we meet again, I shall have many things to tell you. Of my immediate past I only say that my intended journey to Greece has come to nothing; there were too many impediments, which I found it impossible to overcome. Better than anything else I should have liked to get out of the world altogether. Of this more later on.
As I understand that you are going to perform Lohengrin as early as August 28, I must not delay my instructions any longer, leaving other matters for a later communication. First of all, I have dealt in the enclosure with scenery and decorations. My drawings made for that purpose will give you great delight; I count them among the most successful creations of my genius. Where my technique forsook me, you must be satisfied with the good intention, which will be clear to you from the literary explanation attached to it. The trees especially presented me with insuperable difficulties, and if every painter has to perspire over perspective as I have done, his art is by no means an easy calling. As to the rest, I have in my notes always referred to the full score, in which I have indicated, much more fully and clearly than in the libretto, the scenic action in conjunction with the music. The stage manager will have to go exactly by the score, or at least by an arrangement of it. As to the orchestra, I have also put down some remarks for you.
But now I have first of all a great wish to address to you: Give the opera as it is; cut nothing! One single cut I will indicate to you myself, and I even insist upon the omission of the passage, namely, the second part of Lohengrin's tale in the final scene of the third act. After the words of Lohengrin, "Sein Ritter ich bin Lohengrin genannt" [fifty-six bars must be omitted]. I have frequently sung it to myself, and have come to the conclusion that this second part of the tale must produce a depressing effect. The passage is therefore to be omitted in the libretto as well. As to the rest, I must request you urgently, let me for once do as I like. I have been intent upon establishing so unfailing, so plastic, a connection between the music and the poem and action, that I feel quite certain as to the result. Rely upon me, and do not attribute it to my being in love with my own work. If you should feel compelled to make cuts on account of excessive difficulty, I should ask you to consider whether it would not be better to leave the performance alone on account of insufficiency of means. I assume, however, that all possible means will be readily placed at your disposal, and also that you will succeed in conquering every difficulty if you are fully determined to do so. If you make up your mind that it must be, then I am sure that it will be, or else that you would rather give up the whole thing. As to this, I think, we agree.
Concerning the chief thing, the cast of vocalists, I rely upon you with perfect confidence. You will not undertake impossible things. Our friend Götze, to whom I am in any case much indebted for his Tannhäuser, will find more difficulties in Lohengrin, because he lacks in external appearance and voice that resplendent quality which, where nature has vouchsafed it, must make the part easy. Let him supply that resplendence as far as possible by means of art. To look at him ought to make one's eyes smart. A newly revised libretto intended for the printer I send at the same time with this. It will arrive by the ordinary mail. As to this libretto, I have the following wish to express: Sell it, or, if you can get nothing for it, give it to a publisher who will undertake to bring it out beautifully, at least as well as the libretto of Tannhäuser; the Weimar theatre then gets as many copies from the publisher as it wants for sale in the house, allowing a certain commission. This is exactly what we did with Tannhäuser.
As I should like you to dispose of the pianoforte score, made by Uhlig in Dresden, to a music publisher, the best way would be to offer the libretto to the same man whom you have in your eye for the pianoforte arrangement. That libretto, if sold at a moderate price, is, however, by no means a bad business. Of Tannhäuser we sold over two thousand copies.
One thing more: tell me, dear Liszt, how can we make it possible for me to attend the first performance in Weimar incognito? This is a desperate question, especially as at this moment it is no longer, as it recently was, a matter of indifference to me whether I am to dwell in a royal Saxon prison or not. Listen: I hold the Grand Duchess in high regard; would not this lady, to whom I attribute real nobility, at your suggestion be inclined for the stroke of genius of duping the police of united Germany, and of getting me a safe conduct under an assumed name from Switzerland to Weimar and back again to Zurich? I promise faithfully to preserve my incognito in the most stoical manner, to lie perdu in Weimar for a little time, and to go straight back, guaranteeing all the time the strictest secrecy from abroad also. Or would this be more easily achievable through the Duke of Coburg? Of him I hear many things that delight me. Anyhow look into this; you would give a poor devil like me real joy, and perhaps a new stimulus and much-needed encouragement.
If it is possible, or even if it is impossible, I ask further, would you like to pay me a short visit in Zurich soon? You are devilishly quick at such things. If I could see you again now, I should go half mad through joy, therefore wholly mad, as people have surely taken me for half mad a long time since. I would sing Lohengrin to you from A to Z; that would be a real pleasure!
Richard Wagner
Source: Project Gutenberg eBook #3835, Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt — Volume 1, No. 32