Friday, September 15:
I write to the banker Joachim in Berlin regarding the investment of my money for the children. R. works, and says to me, “I am now getting into the musical mood, that is why I am so agitated.” The children are in better health, but Eva is sleepy.
In the afternoon a letter from Frau Wesendonck; she says she is going to Munich to see Rheingold or Walkuere, but does not mention our Bayreuth venture in even a single word. R. is extremely annoyed about it, asks me not to reply, and complains of having spent his whole life consorting with pitiful creatures. “For,” he says, “she knew all about it; our whole intercourse revolved around this production of the Nibelungen, and now just to ignore it all! The worst of it is that one cannot wipe out experiences; one can remove them from one’s heart, but they remain in one’s life.”
The bare mention of the production in Munich is like a dagger in his heart, “and now I am supposed to continue with my work, but how can I?” His grief makes me miserable. He knows that all his friends will go running off to Munich again and none will give a thought to him. Frederick the Great provides some slight distraction.