My dear, kind Otilie,
I, too, have finally got round to sending you a couple of lines to remotest Denmark - it is now so long since I last saw you that I feel a very real need to speak to you again, at least in writing; and yet there is so much I should like to tell you about these last twelve months - which have seen such decisive changes in my life - that I am afraid that a single sheet of paper will not be sufficient for my needs; and so, for the time being, I shall tell you only what concerns me most. - How much it saddened me not to be able to say goodbye to you when you left! It was this that has upset me most during the whole of the time you have been away; I felt particularly sad, staying in the inn at Culm, where, according to our mother, you had said goodbye for the last time; - well, I expect it will not be long now before we see each other again; for however much you may be enjoying yourself at present, I still hope that you will one day want to return to us, when your feelings towards us have changed. - But now let me tell you about myself, it may give you pleasure to learn how things stand with me, since you showed such care and concern for me in one of your recent letters. - Oh, how it grieves me to have to admit that, for a time, I led a thoroughly dissolute life, and that mixing with students distracted me from my purpose, with the result that I caused our good mother a great deal of worry and distress, until I finally took a firm hold of myself, and was given such encouragement in this resolve by my new teacher that I have now reached the point when I feel I have already embarked upon the course which I now intend to follow in life. I should have explained that for more than six months I have been a pupil of the local cantor Theodor Weinlig, who, with some justification, may be regarded as the greatest living contrapuntalist and who, at the same time, is so excellent a fellow that I am as fond of him as if he were my own father. Such is the affection with which he has encouraged me to develop that, as he himself has remarked, I can already consider my period of apprenticeship to be over, so that the advice he continues to offer me is merely that of a friend. The extent to which he cares for me is proved by the fact that when, at the end of half-a-year’s lessons, our mother asked him what his fee was, he replied that it would be unreasonable of him to accept any payment, such was the pleasure it had given him to teach me: my hard work and his hopes for my future were sufficient of a reward for him. - You can well imagine that all this has borne ample fruit: - last Christmas an overture of mine was performed at the theatre here, and last week I even had one performed at one of the main concerts - let me tell you that this latter is no mean achievement; before any work by a young composer is accepted for such a concert, it has to be deemed worthy of performance by all the musical experts on the board of concert directors; the fact that my own overture was accepted in this way proves that it must have something in its favour. - But now I must report on the performance itself, since it was such an important occasion for me: - Rosalie and Luise were there. I could certainly not have anticipated a lively success, firstly because overtures are rarely applauded at these concerts, and secondly because, shortly beforehand, two new overtures by Marschner and Lindpaintner had been performed without anyone so much as lifting a finger to acknowledge them; - in spite of this I was unbelievably nervous, and I almost died of fear and trepidation; (ah, if only you had been there!). You can imagine, then, my joyful amazement when at the end of my overture, the whole house began to applaud as if they had been listening to the greatest masterpiece - I did not know what was happening to me, I can assure you! - Luise was so moved by it all that she burst into tears: - how I wished you had been there, I am sure that even you would have shared ever so slightly in our pleasure! - Enough of this! — Something else that’s new: - a piano sonata of mine has appeared in print this week, and I have dedicated it to my teacher Weinlig. I have received sheet music to the value of 20 thalers in payment for it. - I would gladly send you a copy, if I did not suspect that the cost of forwarding it to you would be almost as much as the price you would have to pay for it in Copenhagen; all you have to do is go into any music shop and ask them to order it for you from Leipzig, stating the title: “Sonata for the Pianoforte by Richard Wagner 1st work, published by Breitkopf and Haertel” of Leipzig. It is not very difficult, but in the event of your not being able to play it at sight, I suggest that, in my name, you ask Fräulein Lotte to play it for you; it would give me great pleasure to know that you liked it. - In addition, I recently composed an overture to König Enzio, a new tragedy by Raupach; it is performed in the theatre here each time the play is given. Everyone likes it. - But that’s enough on my various compositions, as soon as you are here with us again, it will give me endless pleasure to tell you all of my news, my good sister.
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Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 3