Oh my King! My - friend,
No! it will not end like this, with all that has ripened within me slowly and effortfully during half a century falling prey to the boorish whim of the daemon of confusion and misunderstanding the moment that it is warmed by the sun of your love. No! A moment of calm reflection, and everything will disappear like an insubstantial haze! -
I am ill and wretched. Finally prevented even from leaving the house in order that I might cast my tired eyes around me in search of some quiet apartment, I closed my eyes, worn out by my over-long vigil. What did I then see before me? My dear little house by the Propyläen, the small garden - the peacocks wandering around in it, bathed in sunlight and a sense of calm. “What? is it then my birthday today?” I asked: “after all, it is only the fourth of May?” I looked around me then, and - Siegfried laughed aloud: “it is your birthday, do you not know it?” - Then I awoke, in tears - and telegraphed to my dear, long-suffering friend! -
Do not be angry now, my beloved King! I do not wish to alarm you. But - I am not looking for a new place to live, either here or anywhere else. I intend to remain away as long as you think it appropriate, but, if I am never again to return to my little house - and to you, there is nowhere else I shall ever again stay - nowhere! -
I have written to Lutz: also on the unfortunate matter of your “inconstancy”: you must believe the assurance I gave him. Not I (oh! I?) - but your people, believe me, your people - form these ideas. - But what does all that matter! After all, there is nothing here but confusion and foolishness. - Yet it will all turn out well in the end. God knows what chaos there was! I could no longer hear or see anything. It must never happen again: no doubt about that! Now you must allow me a couple of years of utter peace and oblivion; you alone shall know of my existence: I shall then complete my works. People shall simply not believe that I am still of this world. I shall do everything, everything that is demanded of me, if only I can come back quietly, oh so quietly, and hide myself away again soon in that little house of yours. Let us forget everything - the Academy of Art and God knows what else - for which we should need other people. We have no one now. Time will tell: it really will! But for now only peace of mind and creative work. Keep the Bülows for me. If he asks, give him a year’s gracious leave of absence initially: he will then travel around and get to know people whom we shall later need. - Let us go to ground until the sun comes out again, the beloved Maytime sun! Only remain well-disposed towards me, and never doubt in my faith! But you must also remain in good health for me: bear ill-fortune stoutly and firmly! The days at Hohenschwangau were too beautiful - : my daemon demands his due! Now only be true and dear to me! This is our real test. Ah! What we intend to create is so great, so new, so all-embracing: how could it take root so quickly, like common grass seed in the dry earth! - Have courage and patience! Put a bold face on it, most dearly beloved of men! After all, people ultimately do not mean us such harm. I know that he who knows me is not my enemy: it is just that I am a difficult person to get to know. You know me, and remain true to me! Is that not so? Very well then, when the time is right, I shall steal back once more to my little place of work, silently, oh so silently: not a soul shall know that I still exist.
Is this acceptable to you, my King, my saviour? Forgive me if bitterness overcame me: I have suffered a great deal, a very great deal. But my tears today have washed everything away. - God be with you!
True unto death,
Richard Wagner
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 341