Friday, February 27:
Early today R. complains of the discomfort he always feels in the morning, which makes it so difficult to work, but his divine humor always breaks through triumphantly, and at our late breakfast, at which Herr J. is now always present on account of the sittings, he delights us all with his wit; yesterday, when the subject of Madrid came up, he said, among other things, that he would tarry there to weep on the grave of Philip III. And when Herr J. stands up to greet him during the sitting, he says, “Don’t stand up, otherwise it looks as if I am paying you!”
After lunch, since his quotations from Gleizes have led us to India, he relates to us the story underlying his Sieger, wonderful and moving. He says he will write it in his ripe old age; it will be gentler than Parsifal, where everything is abrupt, the Saviour on the cross, blood everywhere.
In the evening he tells us episodes from the biography concerning his life in Biebrich. Before that Herr v. Stein read to us a dialogue about Pompey which put us in a somewhat heavy mood. In contrast, R. reads to us Herr v. St.’s translation of a sonnet by Giordano Bruno containing a comparison with Actaeon, a poem which R. finds very beautiful, and which fits the sonnet form so perfectly.