Richard Wagner His Life and His Dramas / A Biographical Study of the Man and an Explanation of His Work

by W. J. Henderson

When Wotan has flatly refused to give the ring to the giants, Erda, the embodiment of the earth itself, the impersonation of primeval elements, arises in pale light and mystery. She warns Wotan to flee the curse of the ring. She declares herself to be the all-knowing prophetess, and says:

"Alles was ist, endet. Ein düsterer Tag dämmert den Göttern." "All that exists, endeth. A dismal day Dawns for the Aesir."

This brief scene, so charged with dramatic and musical potency, is Wagner's use of the prophecy of the Wala, as contained in the Elder Edda. That prophecy foretells the end of the gods, but its situation in the story is similar to that of the Erda scene in "Siegfried." It comes near the end of the tragedy. Nevertheless from it Wagner obtained the character of Erda and the prediction made by her in "Das Rheingold." The prophecy of the Wala in the Edda does not touch upon the sin of the gods, but it sets forth in detail the story of Ragnarök, as I have already given it. Wagner, however, connects the Wala's utterance with the ethical basis of his tragedy. Wotan, impressed by the prediction, gives up the ring and ransoms Freia. The curse at once begins to operate. The giants quarrel over the division of the hoard and Fafner kills Fasolt. In the Volsunga Saga, from which this incident is adapted, Fafner slays his father, while his brother Regin plays the part allotted by Wagner to Mime in "Siegfried," as we shall presently see. Fafner goes off to the forest with his hoard, and there, as in the saga, becomes a dragon, by the aid of the Tarnhelm, and lies guarding the hoard, which he does not know how to use, for he is too stupid to employ the power of the ring.

Donner raises a thunderstorm to clear the air after the murder, and when the rain is gone a rainbow is seen spanning the valley of the Rhine. The new castle stands forth in all its glory, and Wotan, inviting Fricka to enter with him, for the first time calls it Walhalla. The goddess asks the meaning of the name, and Wotan replies:

"What might 'gainst our fears My mind may have found, If proved a success Soon shall explain the name."

The thought in Wotan's mind is that of raising up a race of free heroes who shall perform vicariously the expiation denied to him. One of them shall of his own volition rescue the ring and restore it to its rightful owners, thus satisfying the demands of the law and removing the curse. The conception of the hero in the mind of Wotan is made known to us only by the orchestra, which intones the Sword motive here for the first time. In recent years, with the sanction of Mme. Wagner, a new idea has been introduced into this scene. In the hoard is the sword, which is discarded by Fafner as valueless. When Wotan conceives the hero-thought, he picks up this sword and raises it aloft while the trumpet peals out the motive. This was not Wagner's idea, but it is not an unpardonable concession to the demands of the theatre. It was just a little too much for Wagner to expect that his auditors would carry the Sword motive in their minds from "Das Rheingold" to the first act of "Die Walküre," and remember when hearing it in the latter how it was used in the former and thus find out what it meant there.

Over the rainbow—Bifröst, as it is called in the Eddas—the gods enter Walhalla, the Rhine maidens vainly pleading from the valley below for the return of their ring, and Loge gloating over the end to which, as he says, the Aesir are even now hastening. And thus ends the prologue, to which I have devoted much space because it contains the foundation of the tragedy. It presents to us the hero foredoomed to destruction, the crime, and the certainty of its inevitable punishment. That is the subject-matter of the propositional part of a classic tragedy. We are now ready to observe the workings of Wotan's futile plans.

With the passage from "Das Rheingold" to "Die Walküre" we enter upon the struggles of the innocent human beings who have been created by Wotan to work his will. The beautiful drama in which Wagner sets forth the events leading to the birth of Siegfried and the slumber of Brünnhilde on the mountain is built from mere hints in the Volsunga Saga. Volsung is no longer the great-grandson of Wotan, but is Wotan himself. Siegmund and Sieglinde are Sigmund and Signy of the saga, twin children of Wotan. The name Sieglinde is that of Siegfried's mother, according to the "Nibelungen Lied." It is Hunding, not Siggeir, who marries Sieglinde. The fight between Hunding and Siegmund takes place, not because of the former's rejection by the maid, but because of the latter's flight with her. The mysterious one-eyed man strikes the sword into the tree at the wedding-feast, and on his spear the sword of Siegmund is broken in the fight. Siegmund Wagner substitutes for the warrior whom Brünnhilde in the saga once struck down, contrary to Wotan's wishes, and when she is put to sleep on the mountain it is for protecting, not slaying, the wrong man. We find that she is surrounded by fire at her own request, that Wotan rules that she shall marry only the hero who will know no fear and can pierce the fire, and that this hero is to be the offspring of Siegmund and Sieglinde—Siegfried, the full-blooded Volsung, in whose veins flows the blood and in whose heart, freely and unconsciously, works the impulse of Wotan. Let the reader review the story of the saga, and compare it with that of "Die Walküre."

The first act of the drama is taken up with the mutual recognition of Siegmund and Sieglinde, their strange love for one another, the reception of the sword by the hero for whom it was struck into the tree, and the flight of the lovers. Then comes the deeply significant opening scene of the second act. The Valkyr Brünnhilde, revealed to us in all the glory of her divine beauty and strength, starting to the field, is warned not to carry Hunding to Walhalla. To Wotan now comes Fricka, stirred to the bottom of her nature by the deep affront in the action of Siegmund and Sieglinde to her dignity as the goddess of marriage. She demands the punishment of the erring pair. Wotan vainly pleads that the gods need the aid of a hero working of his own free will in their defence. Fricka brushes aside this plea with the declaration that heroes have no powers which are denied to gods. She tells Wotan that it is he who breathes courage into Siegmund, that it was he who struck the sword into the tree, devised the need into which Siegmund should fall, and guided him to the house of Hunding. She stands upon her dignity as the celestial queen and demands that the outrage of her especial laws shall be punished. Wotan must not protect Siegmund in the coming fight and he must forbid Brünnhilde's doing so. By hard-wrung oath she binds her spouse to abandon his own plan and submit to the demands of the inexorable moral law.