No doubt you will guess, Lady-friend, of what weight your letter has been to me ! I told you a while ago that my resolve could not be talked about, but only gradually disclosed by execution ; and now you answer me quite rightly, La vie est une science, — it must be learnt and practised [cf. p. 360]. I believe I am ripe for it, and know but one desire now : Repose and work ! — Of my enterprises for this winter much still remains vague ; all I know for certain, is that I have to make one final effort, not to achieve, but to close behind me. The day after to-morrow (Oct. 31) I go to Prague (Black Horse) for 2 concerts ; Nov. 10 I reach Carlsruhe ; the 14th is the concert there, and should Otto have so far recovered as to be able to bring you thither, I fancy I may promise both of you a fine impression. Thence on, uncertainty pervades my plans : roughly, between then and Christmas I have concerts in prospect at Breslau, Lowenberg in Silesia (Prince of Hechingen), Dresden, perhaps Hanover, and probably Prague once more. Possibly St Petersburg will then take March and April, conceivably Kieff and Odessa the previous January also ; perhaps, too, Pesth again. You may imagine the state of my poor nerves in view of such geography ! It seems almost criminal to myself, but nothing else is left me. Now, I should like in the interval, if you will put me up, to find brief rest with you ; perhaps about Christmastide ; possibly even from Carlsruhe. Don't be astonished — tho' it be only for a few days — if I drag out the portfolio and try to work a little. Moreover, I have a petition as regards my board : please send me lunch and dinner to my room ; meals in common to be reserved for special festivals, and at your special invitation. — Otto's recovery is to me a veritable gift from Heaven ; we here (I and the doctor) quite share your opinion that this illness has been a crisis of most beneficial consequences. All this is very beautiful and profoundly gladdening to me. — Now accept my earnest heartfelt thanks again for your kind letters. — Salute Otto and the children from a loyal heart ; they are all to be good to me ; Yourself as well ! Your R. W. Penzing, Oct. 29, 63. I am sending Otto a brochure [cf. p. 32m], You will judge by it how placably I think of issuing from the world, but will also infer the said issue's necessity from the certainty of my knowledge that even such practical, simple proposals will find no hearing. [As Frau Wesendonck's reply speaks of a chance of Otto's being well enough to take her to Carlsruhe, it is possible that they heard the Meistersinger overture and Sachs' Cobblersong there, either Nov. 14 or at the concert's repetition on the igth. In any case the next we hear of Wagner is from the Green Hill, where he arrives between the 20th and 22nd, and sends Herwegh an invitation in the name of his hosts the 2^(1, for tliat evening. Presumably he spent the best part of a week on the Green Hill, for he does not reach Mainz till the 27th, en route for the concerts mentioned below. — 7>.]
Richard Wagner
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, translated by Ellis, No. 143