Dear and honoured friend,
I finally intend writing to the Wesendoncks again within the next few days. But - I can write only to him. I love his wife too much, I feel so tenderhearted and overcome with emotion whenever I recall her to mind, that it is impossible for me to address her in the form which it is now more imperative than ever that I should be enjoined to use towards her. What I feel in my heart I cannot write to tell her without betraying her husband, whom I sincerely respect and hold in high esteem. What is to be done? Nor can I keep all this locked away in my heart: one person at least must know how I feel. That is why I am telling you this: she is, and remains, my first and only love! I feel this now with increasing certainty. It was the high point of my life: the uneasy and agreeably anxious years which I spent in the growing enchantment of her presence and of her affection contain all the sweetness that I have known in my life. It requires only the gentlest reminder to feel myself in its thrall once more, filled with that wonderfully melting mood which even now, as once before, takes my breath away and leaves me the power only to sigh. And if there be no other reminder, then my dreams may have the same effect, dreams which are always welcome and which do me good each time they put me in mind of her. - Now, tell me, my friend! How can I speak to this woman as I should and must speak to her now? - Impossible! - Yes, I even feel that I must never see her again. Ah, even in Venice it made me deeply unhappy to see her again: only now that this memory has faded completely away is this woman again what she once was to me. I feel that she will always be beautiful in my sight, and that my love for her will never grow cold; but I must never see her again, not under this ghastly constraint which - however necessary I recognize it to be - must mean the death of our love. What shall I do now? Am I to leave my dearest under the illusion that I have grown indifferent to her? Surely that is too harsh! Should you disabuse her of her illusion? Would that do any good? I do not know! - And finally life passes by. It is heart-breaking! -
Since leaving Zurich I have been living the life of a virtual exile: - there is no telling what I have sacrificed! - My only desire is now to regain at least some sense of domestic calm, in order to be able to live for my work alone. Through the most unprecedented exertions I have at least acquired the possibility of establishing another home for myself, which I shall henceforth have to tend entirely on my own. Repeated attempts have convinced me and my friends that it is impossible for me to live together with my wife any longer, and that it would destroy us both if we did so. And so she is living in Dresden, where I am making adequate provision for her, far beyond my means. She cannot fully compose herself, and only by violently suppressing the constant stirrings of pity within me can I force myself to adopt a harshness without which I should merely prolong her suffering and rob myself of all prospect of peace and quiet. I can say quite truthfully that this is the greatest burden I have ever had to bear. By way of compensation, however, I am renouncing everything, and desire only the peace and quiet I need to work, the one thing that absolves my conscience and that can truly set me free! -
But now, my dear Frau Wille! Grant me my request, and let me have occasional news of our friend! I hope you are still fond of her, and that she is equally loyal towards you? It is too hard to know that so infinitely loyal a creature must drag out her existence in so remote and alien a clime, without our ever being able to cast a single glance in her direction. You will understand that what I can discover from her husband does not reveal the friend to whom I can swear eternal love, since I never intend to see her again. Never? - It is hard, - but it must be so! -
I have again opened the green portfolio which she once sent me in Venice; how much torment has been suffered since then! And now, suddenly to be in thrall once more to that old, ineffably beautiful spell! In it are sketches to Tristan, to the music of her poems - ! Ah, my dearest friend! We love but once, whatever life may offer to intoxicate and flatter us: yes, only now do I fully realize that I shall never cease to love her, and her alone. You will, I know, respect the innocence of this protestation, and forgive me for placing this confession before you.
Fare you well, and be ever kindly disposed towards
Your
Richard Wagner.
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 287