My father’s sword yields to his son:
and I’ll forge it myself.
I had just reached this passage, and was brooding over the motif that is to describe the sudden turn of events which marks the beginning of Siegfried’s marvellous feat of forging his sword anew, when I was interrupted by your letter with its confidential news, so that you may now judge what progress I shall make on my work for the rest of today! But I can easily sacrifice “today”, since I now see before me such a long and beautiful “tomorrow” that will encourage me to work, and which I now owe to the rarest friendship and most loyal concern!
You know what you have given me with this news; all else that I lack in life must be denied me; I feel that my only course is renunciation, and that I must seek the unattainable things I desire within myself, and within my own nature. When this awareness began to dawn upon me with increasing clarity, and I was able to seek my solitary consolation and exaltation as far as possible in the uninterrupted practice of my art, all my wishes and desires, inasmuch as they relate to this world, came to assume the single purpose of providing me with undisturbed peace and leisure in order that I might carry out my artistic plans. You know that I told you of this great wish of mine some 5 years ago, when I described it as the longing for a pleasant and peaceful place in the country with a little garden attached. [...] Do you now want to know how I received today’s - totally unexpected - news of the success of your efforts to obtain this plot of land? - A deep, deep sense of calm took hold of me; a feeling of salutary warmth suffused me to the very depths of my being, without, however, causing the least flush of violent emotion. A vision of sunlit brightness suddenly appeared before my eyes, in which I saw the whole world lying before me in calm transfiguration, until a solemn tear fragmented the image into a thousand wondrous refractions. My dearest friend, I have never known anything like it! never before has the force of friendship brought such fundamental encouragement to my life: for what I felt was less a sense of joy at having acquired property than a glorious feeling of warmth which the knowledge of your friendship has given me, the consciousness of being held aloft, which has suddenly lifted every pressure and every burden from me. - Oh, you good, dear people! What am I to say to you? As though by magic, everything around me has suddenly been transformed! All sense of wavering must come to an end: I know where I now belong, where I can work and create, where I shall now find comfort and consolation, recovery and relief, and where I can now face, in total confidence, all the vicissitudes of my artistic career and all the efforts and labours that it brings with it, for I know where I can again find peace and relaxation in their truest sense, in the bosom of such loyal and loving friends! Oh children! You shall be well satisfied with me - indeed you shall! - For - as long as I live - I belong to you, and my successes, like my cheerful good humour and my creative genius, shall now give me pleasure, I shall cultivate and cherish them, that they may give you pleasure in turn! -
Oh, it is wonderful! It has resolved many, many uncertainties! If only I could describe to you the marvellous and profound sense of peace which fills me today! -
Now you must see to it that we meet again soon; I long for that moment with all my heart, and would do so even if my life here were not so isolated. Happily, I do not think we need fear war any longer, but, even in the event of this happening, I believe I can remain protected here. I shall write to you again.
A thousand greetings!
Your
R. W.
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 196