Iseult speaks merrily of the wile of Brangwain in concealing this, the best wine of the feast. Then they drink, and the world is made anew. Here again the agency for the supply of the potion is error. Wagner could not have built his tragedy on such mighty lines if he had left that thought out. His Tristan and Isolde were standing on the brink of a volcanic crater; something was needed to impel them into it. That something was found in the foolish love of the simple-minded Brangäne.
The first act of Wagner's tragedy tells all that is to be told of the serving-woman. She stands disclosed at the very outset as a sublimated comprimaria. She is the titanic Alice to this mighty Lucia, marching to her marriage with one man when she loves another. To this Alice this Lucia tells how she learned to love in days now buried in the sweet and unforgotten past. The comprimaria of the old Italian opera walked about with the prima donna and gave her cues. This new comprimaria follows the same lines, but in how different a manner! Wagner was indeed the regenerator of the lyric drama. Verdi knew it. His Emilia would have been an old-fashioned comprimaria had he written "Otello" in his "Traviata" days.
First, this maid, alarmed at Isolde's passionate prayer that the ship and all in it may be destroyed ere they reach Mark's land, asks what has caused her mistress to be so downcast throughout the voyage. Then she is amazed to learn that Tantris is Tristan, and that her mistress does not wish to be led by him to the couch of Mark. She even offers some cheap, prosaic, and senseless worldly counsel. "If Tristan is under any obligation to you, how can he discharge it better than by making you Mark's queen? Even if he himself did the wooing for his uncle, why should you object? He's a gentleman of rank and reputation." This innocent maid does not even catch the tragic meaning of Isolde's
"Ungeminnt
Den hehrsten Mann
Stets mir nah' zu sehen—
Wie konnt' ich die Qual bestehen?"
"Unloved by the lordliest man, yet always near him, how could I bear that anguish?" This "heroic" Brangäne applies this speech to King Mark and reminds Isolde of the casket of enchanted drinks provided by her mother. When Isolde proclaims that the drink of death is that which she will use, the situation is entirely beyond the comprehension of the maid. She cries: "The drink, for whom? Tristan? Oh, horror!"
The score is significantly barren of explicit stage directions about the substitution of the potion of love for that of death. But there is no question as to what ought to be done. Wagner on more than one occasion fell into the error of leaving too much to the imagination of the public. It is absolutely essential to the understanding of "Tristan und Isolde" by an audience that Brangäne should with the greatest possible clearness exhibit the exchange of the drinks. She should show convincingly, by facial expression and gesture, the sudden formation of the idea of the substitution, and she should be particular to force the act of exchange upon the attention of the audience. Otherwise the subsequent actions of the two lovers are inexplicable to many, for the common experience of the theatre teaches that the points of a drama must be not merely indicated, but driven home; and the whole tragedy of "Tristan und Isolde" rests upon the love potion.
The potion once swallowed, Brangäne, who, "confused and shuddering," has been leaning over the ship's rail, turns and bursts out with a cry: "Woe, woe! Unpreventable endless trouble instead of brief death!"