Monday, May 29:
R. had a good night. In the morning I receive a letter from Lusch which is on the whole encouraging, but R. does not wish to know anything about it, since her departure has offended him. He reads Die Kawi-Sprache, would like to start on his large work, but cannot, because of the unrest the impending performances arouse in him, against which there is nothing he can do.
At lunch he says that, if one wishes to describe our times, all one needs to say is, “Whereas all others respected their ancestors above all, we consider ourselves superior to everyone else.” Then he talks about love and what can happen to a generation in which civilization thwarts Nature’s most serious purpose. For example, he says, Romeo loves Juliet, she him, but civilization makes him marry Rosaline and Juliet marry Paris, what stock can come out of that? It is for this reason, he adds, that Tristan is his most tragic subject, since inner Nature is hindered in its highest work.
At coffee we receive news about London, a letter from Cyriax is read aloud, R. is upset by Grav.’s inability to understand it, and he scolds Boni for chatting with him alone, which she does to keep him from feeling left out. In the afternoon we drive out to the Fantaisie, but unfortunately encounter many beggars on the way. However, the garden makes a charming impression, lilac and laburnum in bloom, and we are in very cheerful spirits, which rise even higher in R. when he enters our house again and from the hall catches sight of the garden through the salon, then the salon itself. He comes to me and tells me he has been looking for the children in order to say to them, “It is divine here, and my wife is divine” now he will tell me so directly! ... He sits in the garden with the Count while I change my clothes; soon I hear him calling me, and learn from the Count what R. has been saying about me! ... That no man has ever had such good fortune. A charming hour ensues, surrounded by animals: doves drinking, dogs tussling with one another, blackbirds hopping unafraid on the lawn. At supper R. speaks of the Goths and how difficult it is to visualize men like Alaric and Theodoric, “beings daemonic full of themselves, yet regarded by the entire Roman world as rabble.” I observe that they were probably not unlike Alexander; R. says, “Much more daemonic.” The evening is somewhat difficult; friend Wolz. comes over, but somehow it is impossible to get a conversation going, though R. is not tired.