Cosima's Diaries

Diary Entry of July 3, 1873

Overview

The day begins in emotional unrest, with a sleepless night and anxious thoughts, but is brightened by Makart's Abmdantia, which the narrator finds original and powerful. Both are struck by the tragedy of a great work meant for a specific place but forced into wandering exhibition. The evening shifts toward friendship, art, and melancholy reflection, ending with birdsong, sunset, and thoughts of death tempered by the consolation of the garden.

Content

Thursday, July 3:

I had a wretched night, with all kinds of thoughts, drafting letters, giving up the celebration, and so on. In the morning I visited Makart’s Abundantia, which is being exhibited here and truly delights me. It is a pleasure that a German is now so original in his conception and so bold in his execution, with no imitation of any known model to be detected.

It is sad that no house can be found to buy this picture and that it has to tour about like a menagerie, for the very fact that it was designed for a particular room and a particular country, Hungary, which accounts for its Serbian, Turkish, and modern Greek coloring, contributes so much to its excellence. But now it must wander about homeless and badly lit, and Makart goes on working for art dealers, certainly earning a great deal of money, but degenerating in the process! The picture interested me so much that I returned home and persuaded R. to leave his corrections of the ninth volume and come to see it. He shares my feelings.

R. wants to have a bust of me, he says: “If only I could be of such help to you with it as you have been with mine!” In the afternoon we went to the new house, and then R. went to the Riedelsberg, where the Thursday gathering is now being held. He returned home speaking of a plan: the good people want to undertake a journey together, as they do each year, and they invite R. to join them. He says, “It’s all right for those who are glad to get away from their wives, but for me—” He wishes that I and the children might also go, but that would hardly be possible.

I remained in the garden a long time, listening to the birds; two blackbirds were conversing. The sun went down in a fiery glow. Profound solace! The grave lies there in silence, “soon, soon thou shalt rest, too.” I read Saint Paul on my own. When we were speaking of what the Schlegel brothers did for the German cause, R. said, “Goethe and Schiller did not concern themselves much with the German idea; their attitude toward it was like Frederick the Great’s attitude toward them.”