Monday, September 26:
“All I care for now is tranquillity. Tristan came storming along and gave rise to Siegfried, too, but now I find emotional scenes repugnant, and it is something which disturbs me in Parsifal as well; all I want to do now are things like the scene in Die Walküre where she goes to fetch the water, or the scene in the 3rd act of Parsifal (anointing and baptism).”
At lunch our friend Judith Gautier; I do not yet know whether this is pleasing to R., or just embarrassing, as he says. He goes for a drive with me in the direction of Heinrichsreuth, talking of when coal was first discovered, and whether one could hope a day would come when people no longer went down mines - an American jungle would surely suffice to keep the world supplied with fuel. But, above all, the climate - he keeps coming back to that. Then, seeing some geese, he laughs loudly: “They are the victims of civilization, so clearly designed for swimming and flying, and now forced by human beings to waddle.”
Strange evening with Mme Gautier - when the others sit down to a game of whist, R. says, “This is Forges all over again!” My feelings are strange; I leave the room. When I return, R. is reading aloud his material for Die Sieger from Burnouf.
For me Loldi, now returned, is everything today - indeed, all the children, who show me the point of living. What do children ever owe to their parents, compared with what they give to their parents?