A scenario of Lohengrin is being published this summer by Breitkopf and Härtel, too late for you. You must get on as best you can. I am forced to leave you in the lurch this time; I am too tired. But neither you nor the stage-manager can go wrong if you both follow my preface to a hairsbreadth. If only no remark of mine goes unnoticed, everything necessary will have been done. Of first importance is the Lohengrin himself. By his appearance and the tone of his voice, Lohengrin must seem a saviour and a miracle and stir all hearts to blessed emotions. Take care! In Weimar Lohengrin was abominable.
Speaking of Weimar, I may tell you that on the purely musical side everything was arranged there magnificently from the first by Liszt, whereas the staging and presentation, on the contrary, under the direction of a dull stage-manager, were totally neglected. They came to me about cuts that were thought necessary. I had discovered where the trouble was and wrote and told them they might cut what they liked; the very fact that they thought it necessary to cut was evidence enough for me that the performance would be altogether unsatisfactory. The stage-manager then proposed certain cuts to me, whereupon I had to show him that he had simply failed to understand the passages he wanted to omit, and how he could best use these very passages to make the whole intelligible. After that they tried omitting this or that for a time, for the sake of saving five or ten minutes. Then Liszt saw the position and since then Lohengrin has always been given in Weimar complete and without cuts. There is no denying that in this way the thing makes a very affecting impression. Well, that is in the essence of the subject. I do not proffer easy entertainment; I deal in terror and pity. It is my only means of touching the folk of to-day. If this essence of the subject is to be changed, it will of course be emasculated and nothing remains but dissatisfaction; the true impression will never appear. Therefore test your company's powers of giving, of absorbing and of assimilating; if my work does not accord with these, leave it alone.
And now for something else. Yesterday my little kapellmeister Schoneck of Posen wrote telling me that he had recently had an offer of your post from Wiesbaden, on my recommendation too, indirectly it is to be presumed. He was intensely delighted at the prospect of getting away from that filthy Posen, when at last they wrote again from Wiesbaden that Herr Lux of Mainz was to get the post, which again depressed him very much. Listen, my dear friend: if there is still anything to be done in the matter, by all means work for Schoneck. I can truly congratulate any theatre that gets so immensely active and able a young man as director. As a musician he is commonplace and insignificant as a man, without much culture; but his specific talent as a conductor is quite extraordinary. As such he is nervous and exquisitely sensitive and incredibly diligent and resourceful in finding unlooked-for ways and means. Honestly I wish the poor devil a good post. If you can still get Wiesbaden for him I should be very glad. The matter is of some importance to me too. If you are to leave Wiesbaden so soon, it is far from indifferent to me into whose hands my Lohengrin, a new-born nursling, is to come. Lux is said to think my Tannhäuser a piece of musical nonsense. I cannot prevent him thinking so, but, true to my convictions, I would gladly prevent him from producing my works, for I know that he cannot produce them properly while remaining unsympathetic. Unfortunately you have gone so far with Lohengrin now that it would be difficult for me to withdraw it from Wiesbaden, a thing I should be strongly inclined to do if the appointment of Lux as your successor is confirmed. See that this reaches the proper quarter.
Richard Wagner
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner, Volume 1, ed. Altmann/Hull (London: Dent, 1927), No. 242