Parsifal: Story and Analysis of Wagner's Great Opera

E-text prepared by David Newman, V. L. Simpson, Chuck Greif, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/c/)

Richard Wagner

Story and Analysis of Wagner's Great Opera By H. R. HAWEIS Author of My Musical Memories, Music and Morals, etc .
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY NEW YORK AND LONDON 1905
NOTE —
This story and analysis of Parsifal was first published as a part of Mr. Haweis' well-known work, My Musical Memories. The interest it has excited seems to justify its republication at this time in a separate volume. F. & W. Co. Published, February, 1904



I visited Bayreuth on the 24th of July, 1883, and attended two crowded performances of Wagner's last work, Parsifal . In the morning I went into the beautiful gardens of the Neue Schloss. On either side of a lake, upon which float a couple of swans and innumerable water-lilies, the long parklike avenue of trees are vocal with wild doves, and the robin is heard in the adjoining thickets. At my approach the sweet song ceases abruptly, and the startled bird flies out, scattering the pale petals of the wild roses upon my path. I follow a stream of people on foot, as they move down the left-hand avenue in the garden of the Neue Schloss, which adjoins Wagner's own grounds.