"Ferdinand. 'I think I follow you quite. What you mean is, that in the opera buffa the Fantastic element takes the place of the Romantic (which, in general terms, you consider an essential principle of opera), and the art of the poet has to consist in this--that the characters must appear, not only with much finish, and standing out in alto-relievo, as well as being poetically true, but so clearly drawn as well from everyday life, and so full of individual character, that the spectator at once says, "Look there! that's my next-door neighbour, whom I say 'How are you?' to every day. And that's the student who goes to his lectures every morning, and sighs so tremendously as he passes his cousin's window," etc., etc. And then all these people are to be subjected to the spell of some Puck, in such fashion that what they set to work to do under that influence, and all that happens to them, are to affect us as if we were there on the spot, sharing their experiences with them, under the influence of the same spell.'
"Ludwig. 'Exactly. And I scarcely need say that, according to my principle, music adapts itself well to opera buffa, and that in so adapting itself there results a certain special style which makes a special impression of its own on the hearer.'
"Ferdinand. 'Do you think music can express all the shades of the Comic?'
"Ludwig. 'I am quite sure it can; clever artists have proved it scores of times. For instance, music can express the most delicate and delightful Irony. That is the predominating element in Mozart's glorious "Cosi fan tutte."'
"Ferdinand. That, by the way, leads me to the remark that, according to your principle, the so-much disparaged text of that work is really highly suitable for an opera.'
"Ludwig. 'That is exactly what I was thinking of when I said, a little while ago, that for his classic operas Mozart always chose really suitable texts, for "Le Nozze di Figaro" is more a Comedy in Music than a true Opera. The nefarious attempt to turn pathetic dramas into operas can never come to anything; our "Orphan Hospitals," "Oculists," and so forth, are sure to be soon forgotten. And what could have been more miserable and opposed to the true spirit of opera than all that series of vaudeilles of Dittersdorf's? But on the other hand I call such works as "The Sunday-Child" and "The Sisters of Prague" admirable. One might style them true German opere buffe.'
"Ferdinand. 'They have always amused me greatly, at all events, when decently given; and I have always thought of what Tieck makes his "poet" say to the public in his "Puss in Boots": "If you want to enjoy this thoroughly, you must divest yourself of whatever you may have attained in the shape of cultivation and learning, and become wholly as little children, so as to enjoy it as such."'
"Ludwig. 'Unfortunately those words, like many others of the kind, fell upon stony ground, and could take no root. But the vox populi, which is generally the vox Dei in theatrical matters, has drowned the few isolated sighs and groans which super-delicate and sensitive people have given vent to over the sad untruthfulness and tastelessness of those works--"trifling," according to their ideas. And there are instances on record of some of those very people who, in the height of their calm, contemptuous, aristocratic impassibility and supercilious scorn of the whole thing, have been so carried away by the infection of the roars of laughter of the "baser" folk about them that they have burst out laughing in the most deplorable way themselves, declaring that they had no idea what they were laughing at.'
"Ferdinand. 'Wouldn't Tieck, if he had chosen, have written splendid opera plots, according to your definition of them?'
"Ludwig. 'No doubt, being a true romantic poet; and I remember I did once think of writing music to a plot of his. But though the subject was well adapted for music, the work was too diffuse and lengthy; not concentrated enough. It was called "The Monster of the Enchanted Forest," if I remember rightly.'