Yesterday was my birthday. It was a wholly detestable day. No one, not one sympathetic person— Ah, Minna, I am entirely miserable, I wouldn't know what to do with myself if fate should long delay our union. I am dead to everything, inwardly I am wasting away and I am more aware than ever that only a happy life with you can restore my powers. Only then, I feel, will I be able to take hold and work as a vigorous and happy man; every hope that beckons to me when I am alone has simply no existence. My child, I just read through all your letters one by one, and rejoice as one blessed in our love; how it has developed and enfolded us ever more closely. I am touched to the depth of my being. See, Minna, I can yearn again, with all the youthfulness and longing of a year ago, so ardent, so young does my love remain. And what a love this is! What couple ever showed more fortitude than we? Suffering the most oppressive hardships of life, almost crushed by the weight of our worries, we have continued to love and long for each other, as if nothing else in life mattered to us. My love for you is so strong, stronger than it ever has been. Is this not beautiful? And what have we not gone through! Are we just a couple of lovers, are we not more proven and more inwardly bound together than many a married couple? Well, we will fight it through and give an example of what true love is able to do and to be. Recently I saw Fidelio in the opera house. Schwabe was sitting beside me. At the place where Leonore has saved her Florestan and embraces him, my eyes filled with tears. Schwabe supposed it was the drama that had moved me; but oh, what had happened in my soul! I thought: "Like Leonore your Minna would give up her life for you, or accept any suffering, any hardship to save you, if she knew you were threatened with ruin. And this Minna I should abandon, as some cold-hearted people suggest? A wife who everywhere would follow me in steadfastness and love?" And is it not true, my Minna, that you would do this for me? I know it, you would do it, you have proved it to me, and I—What am I talking about? Is it still possible that we are to be separated? Are we not already united, and what bond is stronger than ours? Can any bond be stronger than that which is forged by suffering and sympathy? It has made us one, you are my wife!
May 24th: I shall write you something every morning, my angel, so that you may have a complete diary from me. Never has my sleep been as restless as now—it drives me early out of my bed, the lonely bed which gives me no comfort. I can say that I dream only of you, but they are disquieting dreams— What is to happen? I am on the best imaginable terms with Cerf—he thinks so highly of me that he announced out loud in the Kronprinz yesterday that Gläser would leave soon and that during his absence I would take his position and might perform my opera. The opera, of course, is my main concern. For a long-term engagement is entirely out of the question here. At the utmost, my hope and my aim is that, if I were unable to begin my engagement in Königsberg right away, I might remain here about six weeks or two months in Gläser's position, which certainly would bring me much honor and reputation. During that period I'd perform my opera, and if people become favorably disposed toward me, which my writer friends will promote—I would conclude, before leaving, a contract with Cerf from next year on; for at that time Kugler's contract is to expire; but it goes without saying that I'll demand more authority than Kugler so as to alternate with Gläser and to get a higher salary than his. Thus I would come to Königsberg at the end of the summer, and would marry you speedily, and return with you after a year to Berlin, where you may not need to be at the theater at all; for by that time, I expect also to earn something by my compositions. All this is quite good, and better than I had anticipated. My real preference, however, would be to go to Königsberg at once—the Berlin opportunity will not escape me, and in Königsberg I know someone whom I prefer to Berlin and the whole world, and this someone is you, my own, my all. Berlin is less important to me at present than it is for the future. Ah, my Minna, could I leave you alone for so long a time, could I do it at all? You know how indispensable you are to me; you know what I am without you!—A restless, deserted, unhappy man, who, lacking you, lacks breath, air, and everything. And this is not an empty phrase; you know well how true and how obvious it is. O my Minna, my Minna. Are you cheerful now, or are you suffering too?
The 25th. Every day from now on I shall be looking for a letter from you; it is torment for me. Can you believe that I have no further use for this whole, great city of Berlin, except to find a reminder of you? What an insignificant person this Schwabe is after all, but I am with him a good deal because he knows about our love, and I can always talk with him about you. Yesterday I rode to Charlottenburg with him, Dedel, and someone from Königsberg; our conversation was about nothing but you; I was also told that Herr Hübsch is said to be a handsome young man, and they wanted to make me jealous; but this time they didn't succeed, for I know well enough that though you did leave your picture with Herr von Barby, which you tried in every way to deny, a real faithlessness would be impossible for you now, because I know you to be true to me in your heart. Conditions and life in Königsberg were described to me by several people from there as being not so very unpleasant; on the contrary I am sure that, united with you, I would like it there as well as anywhere. I learnt from Wohlbrück in Riga that L. Schuberth, your director of music, is certainly to go to Riga by fall, and that therefore I could join you then in any case, if not earlier. But I couldn't stand being separated from you until then. Do everything you can to bring me to you soon—otherwise I can't bear it. As I told you, Berlin won't escape me. Cerf will finally put on my opera, even without me, and I'll get a contract out of him beginning next year. But someone has told me that we will like Königsberg so well that we won't leave it soon. Schwabe already has had set aside for me the most beautiful, heaviest white satin for your bridal gown, which I'm to bring along. Minna, Minna my angel, soon, soon! I die with longing.
It is the 26th already and I have no letter yet from you. You probably have gotten my first letter long ago. O Minna, my restlessness is becoming unbearable. I am not only indifferent toward all other things, they even disgust me now. No, Minna, you could hardly imagine the strength of my love; I must be united with you or I shall be dead to everything. I have thoughts for nothing, desire for nothing, nothing has any meaning for me. I am young, but while I am alone life has already ceased to have interest for me. When something turns out well for me, like my negotiations with Cerf, I find pleasure in it only in so far as it is a further step toward our happiness together. I know now that my opera is to be given here, and that is worth much. Even though we go far away from here I shall still have left something behind that may facilitate our return. If the opera pleases, and I have no fear about that, what a step forward that will be—for it will not remain unknown to the world. I shall give my opera here on commission. Then I will put notices in the papers and offer it to the directors, gaining reputation and money, and you will have an efficient husband. In any case I am sure of an engagement here from the next year on, and with such a prospect I can marry you with a clear conscience, for I have done something for our future. Only the immediate future must still be your care, for, if I can't be with you in fourteen days at the latest, I'll come on foot and beg my way to you. Then you'll have to receive and take care of me, a poor sinner, for I can stand it no longer without you, and Berlin is secured for me and shall not slip away from me. Write, write, do you hear? Write much, good things, everything, my sweet angel, and hide nothing from me. See, Minna, is it not quite terrible that I can't learn even now where you stayed here? I didn't arrive here until Wednesday morning, but if I had arrived as early as Tuesday morning, according to our agreement, you would still have been here and I would not have known where, and might not even have seen you again. Was this your intention, you terrible person? Tell me! Oh, you sometimes do such strange things that I often don't know what to think of it! You ought to avoid such things; after all, you know how sensitive I am. Come, you terrible, lovable, good, sweet girl! But write soon and don't leave me here in trembling uncertainty!
The 27th. Today a letter should come. O my God how agonizing! Yesterday I read in the Königsberger Zeitung of the 21st: "To theatergoers we bring the good news that Fräulein Planer, the charming actress who has been engaged for our stage from Magdeburg, arrived in this town." Alas, this news has filled me with many misgivings. I see you far, far away from me, owned by strange, crude people. You appear to me as no longer my Minna at all. I see how all of them enjoy you and I begrudge them this enjoyment, I want to enjoy you all by myself. It won't be easy for you with me now, Minna. Perhaps even with the best intentions you will not be able for the moment to put through my Königsberg engagement, but I shall become suspicious and believe that you don't want to have me with you. In the long run you may like your life as it is now, then will you forget me and no longer think of me? No, Minna, has it not become impossible that we could forget each other? What am I thinking of? Of course such a thing could never be. It is true, it is true, that you love me, you have at the very least a warm feeling for me, and for this I shall thank you as long as I live, my angel.
After lunch: Today at noon your letter came. The impression it made on me was too strong; it left me speechless for some time. Even now I still feel too much shaken and moved to answer everything and express all that I feel; I will do it when I am calmer. To love a human so, nay, to adore her, as I love and adore you, to know how warmly she responds to my love, and still to have to face a still longer separation, this is more than hard, this is terrible. O my sweet blissful wife, my all, my all. You are more to me than you can conceive or imagine; a letter like yours which I can hold in my hands means more to me than a world; oh, I could rave to you of my love! My Minna, our love must be rewarded, and, believe me, a devotion like ours is rare in these days. So let us have confidence in Heaven, in the heaven which we bear in our hearts, it must make us happy, happy. Steadfastness, firm courage, firm unshakable trust one in the other, and "A curse and a shame forever on the first who breaks the faith!" Hold on, my child, have only one thought—your Richard with all his grief, his pain, and his love, and remember the oath we exchanged with hot tears, when we swore never to separate in life, to bear everything with courage, never to waver in fidelity and faith. So, God helping, trust and faith, firm trust, firm faith; let this be our motto—and bravely to bear trials, even though it robs me of my night's sleep; every waking moment I'll cling to your sweet image, and then I'll not need to sleep; to think of you is more restoring.
I will remain in Berlin until you release me from my exile with the happy news that I may hasten to you. I am certain, as I have already written you, that Schuberth is to return to Riga in the autumn. (But write me at once if you should learn anything to the contrary.) If I can't come to you any earlier, I'll wait here until Gläser begins his leave of absence, then I'll take his place in the meantime and perform my opera. But then you must release me, for I'll never find the strength to endure our separation. But if there is a single possibility for me to come still earlier to Königsberg, never hesitate to call me quickly, quickly to you. How I shall get along here until then, how manage to earn something, how satisfy the Gottschalks so early, that is more than I can tell you at this moment, but it is obvious that it has to be done. How I have roughed it so far and squeezed through, you may already have recognized by the fact that I had to send the last letter and this one to you "collect." But see, a firm hope makes us bear any misery. I'm not complaining of my fate on my account, but only on yours—that I have subjected you to privation and misery pains me to the depths of my soul. My poor, poor wife, what have you not suffered through me! If I can't make it up to you in the future, God remove me at once from this earth, for then I'm not worthy of you! Alas, see, I am weeping again, I grow despondent, all my strength is leaving me. I implore you, I embrace your knees, make it possible, move heaven and earth, strain all your powers, to get me soon to Königsberg, to you, to you. I'll not bear it, I can't bear it, I am afraid of a serious mental breakdown, I can't stand it any longer, I must be with you. Honor, fame, gold, and magnificence may beckon to me here, but I'll collapse under the burden, for you must know, my dear, no one has loved as I, no one has been loved as you are loved!! The strength of my love takes always deeper root, and see, there is no part of my being which is not filled with a bright, clear love for you. If I had more luck, then you could be proud, for you would be the happiest being on earth—Oh, why must I say: Farewell! Why can't I kiss you until I die!—
Your
Richard
Karl, the good boy who bitterly wept when he left me, left Magdeburg one day after me.
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner: The Burrell Collection, ed. John N. Burk (Macmillan, 1950), No. 14