I shall only be able to make an occasional excursion this summer, for I have bowed myself to the yoke. But I will not murmur for the yoke is light, and even where it galls me it is growing easier. I am treated here with a respect such as has certainly not been the lot of any other in the same position. Half a year ago I was still a vagabond, not knowing where to turn next, and now I have an appointment for life with a fine salary, the prospect of a steady increase of the same and a sphere of operations far more spacious than most. It has been made no secret that I am expected to effect a truly artistic reorganisation of musical life here, with the result that any proposals of mine are adopted unreservedly, a fact which no little increases the estimation in which I am held, especially as people have long been accustomed to seeing Reissiger utterly powerless. Another director of music has, moreover, been appointed now, lest my time should be too much taken up with business. I can ask no more. The first opera not my own which I rehearsed was Gluck's Armide. People were beside themselves over my interpretation of this music, so far removed from that of our own day, and over the nuances which I was able to suggest to the orchestra and singers. During the opera the King conveyed me his thanks and the highest encomiums. He has a real good-hearted liking for me, so that I am sure that if, for instance, I asked sometime for long leave of absence I should only have to say that I wanted it for the completion of a new composition and I should get it at once. You see my post is a really pleasant one, and I come more and more to see that I greatly needed something of the kind. Without it all the success of my operas would not have been sufficient for me to live on. I realise with horror how low is our national sense of honour in this matter of dramatic music also. The results of the long period when our theatres were open exclusively to French and Italian music are still felt even now when Frenchmen and Italians have quite lost their credit. If ever an operatic performance caused a sensation in Germany that of my Rienzi did. I am constantly receiving proofs that it has been discussed, verbally and in print, in the farthest corners of Germany, and yet not a manager in the country has up till now made serious preparations to give the opera! Because I understand the basis of this evil I shall not despair, but shall exert myself vigorously to overcome it in time. It will be a slow business, but it shall and must be done. But no more Paris for me I shall let that alone for ever. We operatic composers cannot be European, that is to say, we must either be German or French. One can see now what harm a tomfool like Meyerbeer does us. One foot in Berlin, and one in Paris, he achieves nothing anywhere, least of all in Berlin. I cannot describe how horribly bad things are there. That is the result of trying to trim one's sails to all winds, like friend Giacomo! God knows when anything will come of my Dutchman there. Yesterday Meyerbeer wrote to me that it was to come out in May, the lousy rascals! For the rest, I have sold this opera to two theatres already, Cassel and Riga, to the first for 20 louis d'or, to the second for 15. You see how modestly I have to begin. But it will not go on like that! I am still not financially straight, I have such a lot of stupid expenses. I have now got to have a court uniform made at the cost of about 100 thalers! Is it not insensate? I have not yet looked for publishers for my operas. I will wait first for them to become known on other stages, and then the music dealers will have to pay me properly. For the present I must still go softly. What the Leipzigers think of me you can see from the Musikalische Zeitung of Leipzig. This organ of Mendelssohn's has so far said hardly one word about my operas! I have it from a trustworthy source that Mendelssohn, who now means to compose an opera, is more than jealous of me, and the Leipziger clique who follow Mendelssohn implicitly do not know what sort of face to pull at me - the asses! Still, Heaven grant that Mendelssohn brings out a good opera; there will be two of us then and two can do more than either alone. You blame me for letting myself go about Berlioz, etc., in my autobiography? I must first of all tell you as to that, that what I wrote was not intended for print. It was to serve as a note for my biographer, and I have put myself down in all my nakedness so that he should know where he was with me. I was myself surprised by the publication of what I wrote. But, for the rest, why should I stand on ceremony with Berlioz? He assuredly has not deserved it of me as he proved here in Dresden where it was gall to him to see the success of my operas. He is an unhappy fellow, and I certainly would not have written anything against him had I first been present at the concerts he gave here! The libretto of the Venusberg is finished. It will be composed this summer. Everyone here is already in expectation of the opera.
Richard Wagner
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner, Volume 1, ed. Altmann/Hull (London: Dent, 1927), No. 84