[...] As regards the role of man of letters which I have been playing in recent years, I have to say that this role has now begun to irk me greatly. If I look back on it with any satisfaction, it is only because I feel that in the process my own thoughts on the subject have become perfectly clear. But it can only fill me with a sense of indignation and depress me to the very depths of my being to observe the impression which my writings have made on the outside world. Tell me, among all the voices which have so far been raised on the subject, is there a single person who might be thought capable of understanding what is at issue here? It is true, I had a low opinion of present-day writers on art, but I never expected to find such unmitigated wretchedness! People have grown so dreadfully stupid that they - literally - no longer know how to read: am I now expected to have to teach them how to read as well? — [...]
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 141