Monday, April 24:
In the morning a knock at the door. Who is there? I. Who? Karl Pusinelli. A splendid boy, whom I earmark as a friend for Fidi.
At 10 o’clock went to the picture gallery, above all to show R. Titian’s Christ and the Tribute Money. At first he was downright disconcerted by the individuality of Christ’s face, but then all the wonder of the work came through to him; he thought it “not without a hint of aristocratic superiority.” My favorite Madonna by Titian also pleased him vastly, much to my joy.
After her I show him almost the whole gallery, ending in meditation in front of Raphael’s Sistine Madonna. As a painter Titian is the greatest technician; his pictures kill the Veroneses, van Dycks and Rubenses, but not Raphael, the Leda of Michelangelo, or Holbein.
At 4 to lunch with the Pusinellis. R. climbs the highest tree in the garden. After lunch we are both very tired; an infinite melancholy takes possession of me. While my friends are all attending the performance of Die Meistersinger, we wander in the evening through the streets of Dresden; when will death at last come to us? When we are with the children we are conscious of our duty to go on living, but when we are with other people, the longing for death comes over us with almost unconquerable force.
I see the shop where R. sold Schiller’s poems in order to buy cream puffs, and where he gave a disabled soldier money and was seen by his father from the house opposite. I also saw the gruesome “Stille Musik,” and R. told me what effect the terrace, the Frauenkirche, etc., had on him in his youth.
We near the theater, and I wish to hear how far they have got in Die Meistersinger. From far away we could hear it, but close to we hear nothing; then suddenly a run on the clarinet comes through to us. It sounds like Tristan und Isolde! We return home; it is cold outside and I cannot help weeping.