Cosima's Diaries

Diary Entry of February 22, 1879

Overview

The writer goes away on a night journey and returns by surprise a few days later, grateful that R. did not pursue her or meet her at the station. The exchange of telegrams, dreams of illness, affection from the children, and her rereading of R.’s earliest letters to Schumann all leave her weighing whether the trip was worth the strain.

Content

Saturday, February 22:

Journey! No diary until Tuesday, the 25th, when my return takes R. by surprise; I traveled in the night. Glad that he did not fetch me from the station or travel after me. (For all else, see his letters, telegrams.)

Enclosed between the pages are ten telegrams addressed to Cosima, giving news, entirely domestic, of Wagner and the children during her absence, and signed variously by Wagner, Wolzogen, Rubinstein, and the servant Georg.

R. was not entirely well; he had bad dreams about me, and he did not come to join me because he also dreamed all the children were ill. Was I wrong to inflict all this on us just to bring him pleasure? A difficult question! May the heavens protect us! The children were very affectionate!

I give R. the letters to read which he wrote to Schumann in earliest times; Herr Levi was kind enough to have them copied for me.