Cosima's Diaries

Diary Entry of April 17, 1871

Overview

Nürnberg in the rain fills Cosima with pleasure, above all through Durer's Christ, which she reads as the German character in its humane sublimity. The painting moves her more deeply than Spanish religious intensity because it seems calmer and less cruel. The travelers then continue to Bayreuth, whose first impression charms them.

Content

Monday, April 17:

A good night in Nürnberg; go out early in the rain, pleasure in everything we see there, but the overwhelming impression comes from Durer’s Christus. Tears of emotion; this is the German character in all its goodness, its purely human and calm sublimity. It has nothing in common with Spanish ecstasy or asceticism; it is more moving than these, which can sometimes seem to us cruel, indeed even cold.

Left at one o’clock, in Bayreuth at five. Charming impression of the town.

In the middle of the above entry the tracing is discontinued, apart from a few individual words in the subsequent lines.