It was a time for rapid impressions to sway the ardent temperament of this boy genius of twenty-one. He read the works of Wilhelm Heinse, who depicts both the highest artistic pleasures and those of the opposite sort. Other authors following the same trend made him believe in the utmost freedom in politics, literature and morals. Freedom in everything—the pleasures of the moment—seemed to him the highest good.
Under the sway of such opinions he began to sketch the plot of his next opera, "Prohibition of Love" (Liebesverbot), founded on Shakespeare's "Measure for Measure." This was while he was in Teplitz on a summer holiday. In the autumn he took a position as conductor in a small operatic theater in Magdeburg. Here he worked at his new opera, hoping he could induce the admired Schroeder-Devrient to be his heroine.
Wagner remained in this place about two years and finished his opera there. The performance of it, for which he labored with great zeal, was a fiasco. The theater, too, failed soon after and the young composer was thrown out of work. His sojourn there influenced his after career, as he met Wilhelmina Planer, who was soon to become his wife.
Hearing there was an opening for a musical director at Königsberg, he traveled to that town, and in due course secured the post. Minna Planer also found an engagement at the theater, and the two were married on November 24, 1836; he was twenty-three and she somewhat younger. Kind, gentle, loving, she was quite unable to understand she was linked with a genius. Wagner was burdened with debts, begun in Magdeburg and increased in Königsberg. She was almost as improvident as he. They were like two children playing at life, with fateful consequences. It was indeed her misfortune, as one says, that this gentle dove was mismated with an eagle. But Minna learned later, through dire necessity, to be more economical and careful, which is more than can be said of her gifted husband.
After a year the Königsberg Theater failed and again Wagner was out of employment. Through the influence of his friend Dorn, he secured a directorship at Riga, Minna also being engaged at the theater. At first everything went well; the salary was higher and the people among whom they were placed were agreeable. But before long debts began to press again, and Wagner was dissatisfied with the state of the lyric drama, which he was destined to reform in such a wonderful way. He was only twenty-four, and had seen but little of the world. Paris was the goal toward which he looked with longing eyes, and to the gay French capital he determined to go.
When he tried to get a passport for Paris, he found it impossible because of his debts. Not to be turned from his purpose, he, Minna and the great Newfoundland dog, his pet companion, all slipped away from Riga at night and in disguise. At the port of Pillau the trio embarked on a sailing vessel for Paris, the object of all his hopes. The young composer carried with him one opera and half of a second work—"Rienzi," which he had written during the years of struggle in Magdeburg and Königsberg. In Riga he had come upon Heine's version of the Flying Dutchman legend, and the sea voyage served to make the story more vital.
He writes: "This voyage I shall never forget as long as I live; it lasted three weeks and a half, and was rich in mishaps. Thrice we endured the most violent storms, and once the captain had to put into a Norwegian haven. The passage among the crags of Norway made a wonderful impression on my fancy, the legends of the Flying Dutchman, as told by the sailors, were clothed with distinct and individual color, heightened by the ocean adventures through which we passed."
After stopping a short time in London, the trio halted for several weeks in Boulogne, because the great Meyerbeer was summering there. Wagner met the influential composer and confided his hopes and longings. Meyerbeer received the poor young German kindly, praised his music, gave him several letters to musicians in power in Paris, but told him persistence was the most important factor in success.
With a light heart, and with buoyant trust in the future, though with little money for present necessities, Wagner and his companions arrived in Paris in September, 1839. Before him lay, if he had but known it, two years and a half of bitter hardship and privation; but—"out of trials and tribulations are great spirits molded."
There were many noted musicians in the French capital at that time, and many opportunities for success. The young German produced his letters of introduction and received many promises of assistance from conductors and directors. Delighted with his prospects he located in the "heart of elegant and artistic Paris," without regarding cost.