[...] As far as the real nature of my London expedition is concerned, my wife has no doubt kept you sufficiently informed on the subject, and you will know that it is basically a matter only for regret that I ever accepted this engagement. The odd thing about it is that my experiences here have certainly not destroyed any hopes or illusions that I might once have had, but that what I find here is simply confirmation of something I already knew perfectly clearly in advance. That I again allowed myself to be seduced into consorting with a world with which I had in fact broken off all relations long ago rests upon an inconsistency in my nature which, to my great regret, has existed for as long as I can remember. My dealings with the public world of art have necessarily brought me to the point where all I can feel for it is contempt, a contempt which every serious thinking person must feel nowadays. The repeated discovery that I can only besmirch myself, i.e. insult my conscience, through contact with this art has already inspired in me the wish to shuffle off the artist in me, in order to stifle a yearning which I can never seek to appease without suffering renewed torments. But all I could probably then become, were I really able to break free from my art, would be a Schopenhauerian saint! Well, I need not worry on that score, since as long as there is a glimmer of life in me, these artist’s illusions of mine will almost certainly not release their hold on me; they are really a kind of decoy with which my instinct for self-preservation repeatedly lures my better judgement into its service. I can really imagine nothing pure and clear that is not immediately contaminated by such images and which, once my insight has passed, repeatedly makes me an artistic visionary once again. The stupidest thing of all is that I can see all this quite clearly and know that I am always the victim of a certain delusion, but, instead of perceiving this delusion as such and protecting myself against it, I allow this, too, to become an image which provides me with the outline and colour I need to portray it, at which point I then turn round to face life once more in all its most sensual and captivating impressions and connections, in order that the dance may start up all over again.
And so this artistic nature of mine is very much a daemon which repeatedly blinds me to the clearest insights and draws me into a maelstrom of confusion, passion and folly, and, finally, restores me to a world which I had really overcome long ago and whose nullity and emptiness is perhaps more obvious to me than it is to many others, since, ultimately - given the lively sensitivity of my own feelings - , it must necessarily reveal itself to me as utterly pitiful. And so there are often moments in my life when I feel so completely annihilated by this insight that I suddenly begin to ask myself whether I can go on living. You will perhaps laugh when I tell you that such moments occur above all when I see an animal being tormented: I cannot begin to describe what I then feel and how, as if by magic, I am suddenly permitted an insight into the essence of life itself in all its undivided coherency, an insight which I no longer see as mawkish sentimentality but which I recognize as the most genuine and most profound way of looking at things, which is why I have taken such a great liking to Schopenhauer in particular, because he has instructed me on these matters to my total satisfaction (?).
It is at moments such as these that I see the “veil of Maya” completely lifted, and what my eyes then see is terrible, so dreadful that - as I say - I suddenly ask myself whether I can go on living; but it is at this moment that another veil descends, a veil which - however dissimilar it may appear - is ultimately always the same “veil of Maya”, in all its artistic forms, which casts me back into the world of self-deception where - gladly (because necessarily), I freely admit, - I then allow myself to become entangled, often to the point of utter distraction.
Well, it really is a pretty awful business! There is no doubt but that I cause many people pain in this way; but it is equally certain that I cause nobody such hellish torments as I inflict upon myself; it is the artist in me who is almost entirely to blame for this; and so, if there is anyone who can derive any pleasure from what I have created, he really has nothing to complain about if I cause him distress, since I certainly suffer more as a result than he himself.
I scarcely think you will understand all that I am saying, for - do not be alarmed - I am bound to think of you as far more worldly than I know myself to be; for you even set store by honour and reputation, i.e. recognition by those very people who are simply not in a position to recognize us, since they are incapable of knowing us. And so I really had to smile when you asked for a good article about me in some English newspaper or other. Fortunately, I know you well enough to suppose that you attach less importance to the article itself than to the effect which you hope it will have in Switzerland. As long as my head is filled with such an insane project as the completion and performance of my Nibelung plays, I can feel only gratitude that I have friends who wish outward successes upon me: if only these outward successes had a little more meaning and sense! That is what is so insane about this whole affair, namely that we must always speculate with counterfeit money, if we have to speculate at all - which is precisely what is so stupid!
My dearest Sulzer, best of friends! Everything here is so full of lies and deceit that one can really only concern oneself with it by maintaining one’s illusions about it and, at the same time, remaining totally remote from it all. I would gladly treat you to a longish stay in England, for I should be keen to hear your verdict on the things of this world. That I, as an artist, feel very much as though I am living in hell here does not mean a great deal: but I should like to know what would happen, as time passed, to your respect for “public opinion”. There is something to be said for observing people at first hand, even if one cannot see into the deepest recesses of their privy councils; but the physiognomy of this entire race has something most decidedly eloquent about it. I am astonished here to see the way in which the boundless emptiness, dullness of intellect and narrow-mindedness of all national and civic dealings are treated simply as though they were self-evident. When one discovers the public secrets of parliamentary life (especially its elections and partisan electioneering), and hears that nobody imagines even for a moment that the people who govern the country take their business in the least bit seriously but follow a traditional routine with the most frivolous coldness - a routine which has the advantage of giving themselves and their private interests an air of respectability and which does not prevent them from having the most sprightly and self-satisfied appearance even at the age of 70 or 80 - , one is no doubt struck by it all, and certainly not with admiration. I may add that England and her sublime political wisdom seem to have reached a critical point in their history: all that one hears points to a period of deep decline, of which the hitherto unemancipated lower orders have only the vaguest premonition but which - one hears it openly said in railway carriages etc. - will lead to a total revolution. What is at issue here is something I cannot go into; to be honest, I have become dashed indifferent to politics and expect nothing from either the continued existence or from the overthrow of existing conditions.
Well, I seem to have got somewhat carried away, so I shall now bring these improvised ramblings to a rapid conclusion. In fact, for some time I have been wanting an opportunity to talk to you at length by letter, since we have always had problems when talking in person, problems which have often proved a sticking point in the past and which, on occasion, have even caused us considerable pain and embarrassment. But what seems to me beyond question is that on the most serious matters we think increasingly alike, indeed, I am sure we are already in total agreement as far as the main issue is concerned. Of course it was not so easy for me to come round to your way of thinking: for a long time my artistic nature forced me to live a life of hope, a hope which was unique to me only insofar as I could hope on behalf of the whole world; the monstrous shapes of this great universal hope I once reduced to the form of certain demands, on which we could of course never agree. Well, I have now renounced this hope, together with all of my demands: what remains is a certain insight and the sincere wish not to be distracted too often from this insight by various kinds of new, but very fleeting, delusions, - but what I feel above all is a desire to be able to return as soon as possible from this splendid city of London to the beauties of Switzerland and to be with my friends again. Well, this final hope is one I may soon see fulfilled, so - fare you well, until we meet again soon,
Yours,
R. W.
[...]
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 185