Thursday, March 18:
R. gets up with a headache, is already in an ill humor when a letter from Dr. Jauner and the unavoidable reply complete his misery. In the evening, when I refer again to the impression the sounds of Tannhäuser made on me, he says, I cannot think of any of my melodies without thinking of the theaters I now have to push to perform my things.
And in the evening: I have lost all my illusions now. When we left Switzerland, I thought it a remarkable coincidence, the victories and the culmination of my work, I asked whether there were not 1,000 people in Germany who would be prepared to give 300 marks for such an undertaking. How miserable was the reply! I have coincided with the most miserable time Germany has ever known, with this beastly agitator at its head. But all the same I brought it off. No one else in the whole history of art has ever succeeded as I did in building a big theater, bringing together through the strength of my personality the best artists we have and staging such performances. And what was my reward for it all? Baa baa! I thought they would simply make up the deficit for me, oh yes, they came along, the women with their trains, the men with their moustaches, enjoyed themselves, and, since emperors and kings were also there, people ask: My God, what more does Wagner want? Does he want something else? I believe that 25 years ago I could have done it better.
We talk about the museum, and R. says, More and more I find myself turning away from the plastic arts, from painting, it is like a curtain one pulls to conceal the seriousness of things. In the evening he tells Herr Jouk. about the production of Tannhäuser in Paris, how magnificently the audience battled in its behalf, but they were no match for the Jockeys, the very club to which our diplomats felt it an honor to belong. He talks of the beastliness of this social class which considered itself so refined.