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

by W. J. Henderson

This opera was offered to the director of the theatre at Leipsic, whither Wagner returned early in 1834, and it is evident that a production was promised, for Laube announced in his journal that immediately after "Le Bal Masqué" by Auber there would be brought forward the first opera of a young composer named Richard Wagner. But when Auber's work had completed its run, the director announced Bellini's "I Capuletti ed i Montecchi," and that was the end of "Die Feen" till 1888. Some of the commentators have found the germs of important features of Wagner's later works in this opera, but there is really no evidence that any direct connection exists. It is true that the story is mythical, but Wagner departed from the myth in his next opera. It is, perhaps, more significant that already the young writer showed some skill in the management of pictorial stage effects. The music was wholly imitative of Beethoven, Weber, and Marschner, with some minor borrowings from Mozart. Here and there can be found musical ideas which recur in later works and which are characteristic of Wagner. The score was constructed on the Italian opera model and contains the regular series of arias, scenas, cavatinas, etc. It has even a "mad scene." Furthermore it is a strikingly melodious score, and very light in touch. But the work has now only a historical interest, and its occasional performances in Munich, about the time that the foreign pilgrims to Bayreuth are in the land, are purely speculative enterprises.

Now came another change in the inner life of this budding genius. In the performance of Bellini's opera, he heard for the first time the great artist Wilhelmina Schroeder-Devrient, and the impression which she made upon him was lasting. As late as 1872 he said, "Whenever I conceived a character, I saw her." The imposing effect which her dramatic sincerity and her consummate command of style enabled her to make with the shallow music of Bellini caused Wagner to become doubtful as to the right method of attaining success. He was powerfully impressed with the importance of the dramatic element in operatic performance. The Leipsic Theatre next produced Auber's "La Muette de Portici," and again Wagner was astonished. Here he saw an opera in which rapid action, fiery impulse, and the manifestations of a revolutionary spirit achieved as strong an effect upon an audience as had the potent acting and singing of Schroeder-Devrient.

The light, spontaneous melody of Bellini seemed to him to express more directly the spirit of young life than the heavy music of the Germans; the plan of Auber's work impressed him as well fitted for combination with the style and character of the Italian music. A union of the two, he thought, would lead toward a true embodiment of the spirit of the time, and so reach swiftly the public heart. The joy of life now became his battle cry. He steeped his soul in the physical literature of the time. He read with avidity the works of Wilhelm Heinse, "the apostle of the highest artistic and lowest sensual pleasures, amongst all the authors of the last century the one endowed with the warmest enthusiasm and finest comprehension for music."[5] "I was then twenty-one years of age," wrote Wagner, "inclined to take life and the world on their pleasant side. 'Ardinghello' (Heinse) and 'Das junge Europa' (Laube) tingled through every limb, while Germany appeared in my eyes a very tiny portion of the earth." Ludwig Börne, Carl Gutzgow, Gustav König, and last of all, Heinrich Heine, became influences in his daily life and thought. The utmost freedom in politics, morals, and literature, the most passionate physical enjoyment of the fleeting moment, were taught by these authors, to whom the reactionary movement in France against all moral and artistic law seemed most attractive. Mysticism ceased to charm Wagner, and he turned to revolutionary freedom in thought as the highest possible good.

With these ideas seething in his mind in the summer of 1834, while spending his holiday at Teplitz, he sketched the plot of his next opera, "Das Liebesverbot [Prohibition of Love] or the Novice of Palermo." In the fall he was obliged to accept a position as conductor in a small operatic theatre in Magdeburg. There he found in the ease with which public success was attained by trivial works further encouragement for the revolt in his soul. He discharged his duties as conductor with the greatest pleasure, and took much trouble to give an impressive performance of Auber's "Lestocq." He had his "Feen" overture played, and also an overture of his own to Apel's drama, "Christopher Columbus." He made a New Year's piece out of the andante of his symphony and some songs taken from a musical farce. But meanwhile he worked assiduously at the score of his new opera, with Auber as his model and Schroeder-Devrient as his hope.

The foundation of the story was taken from Shakespeare's "Measure for Measure," but Wagner altered the plot so as to introduce the revolutionary element which at that time played so conspicuous a part in his fancies. In a "Communication to My Friends" Wagner many years afterward thus described his opera: "It was Isabella that inspired me; she who leaves her novitiate in the cloister to plead with a hard-hearted Stateholder for mercy for her brother, who in pursuance of a draconic edict has been condemned to death for entering on a forbidden, yet Nature-hallowed, love-bond with a maiden. Isabella's chaste soul urges on the stony judge such cogent reasons for pardoning the offence, her agitation helps her to paint these reasons in such entrancing warmth of colour that the stern protector of morals is himself seized with passionate love for the superb woman. This sudden, flaming passion proclaims itself by his promising the pardon of the brother as the price of the lovely sister's favours. Aghast at this proposal, Isabella takes refuge in artifice to unmask the hypocrite and save her brother. The Stateholder, whom she has vouchsafed a fictitious indulgence, still thinks to withhold the stipulated pardon so as not to sacrifice his stern judicial conscience to a passing lapse from virtue. Shakespeare disentangles the resulting situation by means of the public return of the Duke, who had hitherto observed events from under a disguise; his decision is an earnest one, and grounded on the judge's maxim, 'measure for measure.' I, on the other hand, unloosed the knot without the Prince's aid by means of a revolution. The scene of action I transferred to the capital of Sicily, in order to bring in the Southern heat of blood to help me with my scheme; I also made the Stateholder, a Puritanical German, forbid a projected carnival; while a madcap youngster, in love with Isabella, incites the populace to mask and keep their weapons ready: 'Who will not dance at our behest, your steel shall pierce him through the breast!' The Stateholder, himself induced by Isabella to come disguised to their rendezvous, is discovered, unmasked, and hooted; the brother in the nick of time is freed by force from the executioner's hands; Isabella renounces her novitiate and gives her hand to the young leader of the carnival. In full procession the maskers go forth to meet their home-returning Prince, assured that he will at least not govern them so crookedly as had his deputy."

One has no difficulty in tracing in this arrangement of the story the ideas that lay uppermost in Wagner's mind at the time. The heavy, hypocritical governor was a hit at his own countrymen, and the free life of the Sicilians was his embodiment of the sensuousness which he had learned from his recent readings to admire. Auber's "Muette de Portici" no doubt suggested the theatrical value of the revolution, and as he himself says in his account of the writing and production of this opera: "Recollections of the 'Sicilian Vespers' may have had something to do with it; and when I think finally that the gentle Sicilian Bellini may also be counted among the factors of this composition, I positively have to laugh at the amazing quid-pro-quo into which these extraordinary conceptions shaped themselves."[6]

The score of the opera was finished in the winter of 1835-36. The composer, who was entitled to a benefit as conductor toward the close of the season, naturally hoped to bring forward his work on that occasion. Unfortunately the manager was in arrears of salary to many of the company, and some of the principal artists gave notice of their intended departure before the end of March. Wagner, who was liked by all of them, succeeded in persuading them to stay a few days longer and to endeavour hastily to prepare his opera. Ten days were available for rehearsals. By dint of shouting, gesticulating, and singing with the singers, Wagner persuaded himself and them into thinking that the opera was in shape for production. There was a good advance sale of seats, but the manager stepped in and claimed the first performance of the work for himself, and so Wagner was perforce content to wait for the second for his benefit.

The first performance on March 29, 1836, was, according to Wagner's own account of it, absolutely incomprehensible. There were no libretti, and the singers were so uncertain of both text and music that no one could learn the story of the work from them. This was probably well for Wagner in one way, for the censor had passed the book on Wagner's assurance that the subject was from Shakespeare, and as the audience did not know what it was all about, no unfavourable comment was made on the licentious story. At the second performance, owing to the apparent incomprehensibility of the work when first heard, there were three persons in the auditorium, two of whom were the composer's landlord and landlady. Before the curtain went up, the husband of the prima donna, jealous of the tenor, set upon that singer and beat him so that he had to be carried from the theatre. The prima donna tried to interfere and she was also assaulted by her husband. A general fight seemed imminent, and the manager went before the curtain to tell the audience of three that "owing to various adverse circumstances which had arisen the opera could not be given." Wagner subsequently offered this opera to managers in Leipsic and Berlin, but it was not accepted. Later in Paris he contemplated a performance at the Théâtre de la Renaissance, and a translation of the text was begun. But, as Wagner tells us, "Everything promised well, when the Théâtre de la Renaissance became bankrupt! All trouble, all hopes had therefore been in vain. I now gave up my 'Liebesverbot' entirely; I felt that I could not respect myself any longer as its composer."

Mr. Finck recounts an interesting conversation he had with Heinrich Vogl, the eminent Wagnerian tenor, in 1891. Vogl said that after the success of "Die Feen" at Munich it was thought that "Das Liebesverbot" might also be given, and a rehearsal was held. The "ludicrous and undisguised imitation of Donizetti and other popular composers of that time" caused general laughter,[7] but it was really the licentious character of the libretto that brought about an abandonment of the plan to perform the work. But the composer had not yet found himself, and this was one of his attempts to reach success as others had reached it, without any realisation of the vital fact that he was not artistically constituted as they were.