Lucerne, June 23, 59. Many thanks, Lady-friend, I'm in the vein, and have made up my mind — if God does not forsake me altogether — not to come and see you before I can hand you over the red portfolio completely full. That is my wish ; whether it can be fulfilled, I don't know. For I am aware enough how easily one may be put out of tune with such fastidious plans, and believe I owe my present good working-mood merely to the most desperate dudgeon that directly preceded it. What I wrote you about Herwegh, on that occasion, must have been very confused : I had a suspicion of it when I sent the letter off, and have since read H.'s article once more through ; 15° WAGNER TO MATHILDE WESENDONCK which has shewn me that in my letter I must really have meant someone other than H. Let's drop that, and return to Shakespeare's " wagging of beards " [Coriol. ii. i ]. This and the " not so much brain as ear-wax " \Troil. & Cres. v. i] are the kind of quips I find so drastic in Sh. ; and only a man to whom the hollowness of the world is so omnipresent could coin them so originally. Yet we'll drop that too, for even there our own subjective frame of mind may be too strong a co-efficient. The main thing I wanted to tell you, is that I flatter myself I shall be able to end the composition of my act as if by storm now ; the whole vivid thing was revealed to me yesterday as in a lightning-flash. I'm sure you will be pleased at this cause of my staying at home, and wish me good luck on my courageous disobedience to your invitation. There is also a morsel of gourmandry in it: for I feel as if I must be unutterably well of a sudden, once the Tristan is finished : so, perceiving that I can arrive at a feeling of wellbeing no other way, I mean to ensure it by this sleight of hand. Everything eggs me on. My abode is growing more and more impossible. Pianos are closing in around me, strangers on strangers, shoulder-shruggings of mine host : already I've bid sum upon sum to guarantee myself the needful non-disturbance, and still my anxious spirit sees itself once more a wandering Latona ; who nowhere found a spot to bear Apollo on, till Zeus bade the island of Delos arise from the sea for her. (In parenthesis : fables have this advantage, that one always comes to something in their end ; in real life the island stays snugly tucked under the sea, — or at Mariafeld [the wuies' place] — in short, somewhere away !) Yes, my child, folk make things hard for me, and I've no easy time ; in return, there's but one being I can so much as allow to praise my Tristan to me, and that one — doesn't need to. Therefore no one shall even say me " Bravo ! " And — you are right : it really is a worthier life, in this exile of mine, than over there [at Leipzig ?] ; merely you are wrong about the 7-8 years, since it already has entered the nth. I didn't mean to brag of that, however, but simply to cite Hartels as another cogent reason for my work. Their pouts would have left me indifferent, but their instant joy over the first manuscript instalment of the 3rd act has moved me so — it had come to their ears that I meant to break off for a long while again [cf. pp. 129-30] — so ! — so that if you see me come to you, it will only be with the red portfolio, or — in despair. Choose you ! — I hope for the red portfolio — : but I still require a little patience ; it won't go fast. If it but goes ! This morning bon Dieu made a personal tour of the streets. It was Corpus Christi day ; the whole town processed before the empty houses, led by the priests, who had gone the length of donning golden nightgowns. However, the file of Capuchin monks had a most moving effect : in the midst of that unspeakably repulsive tinsel-comedy of religion, all at once this earnest-melancholy file. By good luck, I did not see them too close ; yet I had come across a pair of plain but reverend physiognomies under the capuchin here before ; and the crucifix always enthrals_me. Last evening, so soon as the sly-boots knew by the wind that to-day we should have fine weather, all the children in the churches had to pray for it ; so this wonderful cloudless -morn itself was nothing but a comedy. I drank my fill of it, all the same, and knew well that the weather had strictly been made for myself: I also know who made it. Many thanks ! — Are you cross at my not coming ? Rather ought you not to see Lucerne for once yourself at last in lovely weather ? To come hither, is forbidden to nobody! — Many kind greetings to Cousin Wesendonck, Auntkin and Unclekin ! Keep me in all of your hearts, and I'll be right industrious. — Adio ! Your R. W. Do, please, look in at the art-shop opposite the Post: they had a stock of those big gold pens years ago ; perhaps there's still one left.
Richard Wagner
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, translated by Ellis, No. 80