Dear friend,
Your letter has again caused us a great deal of concern on your behalf. My wife will be writing to you in more detail in a day or so. However, today is a public holiday and I have a free quarter of an hour which - perhaps to your annoyance - I should like to devote to you in order to let you know what we have been saying about you. Amongst other things, I found that I myself never had the sort of male company that you keep in Basle in the evenings: if you are all hypochondriacs, such company is scarcely worth having. But it seems to me that what you young men lack is women: of course, as my old friend Sulzer used to say, it is a question of knowing where to get hold of them without stealing them. But you could of course steal one, if need be. My own view is that you ought to get married, or else write an opera; the one would do you just as much good and harm as the other. But, of the two, I prefer marriage. -
In the mean time I can recommend you a palliative; but you always fill up your medicine chest in advance so that people cannot offer you their own remedies. For example, we are arranging our house etc. in such a way as to be able to offer you accommodation of a kind that was never offered to me even at times of extreme necessity; we intended you to spend the whole summer holidays with us here. But - no sooner had winter set in than you cautiously announced your decision to spend the summer holidays on an extremely high and remote Swiss mountain peak! Does that not sound like careful parrying of a possible invitation from us? We could be of some help to you: why are you so anxious to scorn that help? - Gersdorf and the rest of the Basle crowd could amuse themselves here. There is plenty going on: I shall be reviewing all my Nibelung troops; the scene painter will be painting the sets, and the stage technician fitting up the stage: and we, too, shall be completely involved with it all. - But - we all know about this and various other oddities concerning our friend Nietzsche! -
I refuse to say any more on the subject, since it obviously does no good!
For God’s sake, marry a woman of means! Why does Gersdorf have to have been born a man! Then you should travel, and broaden your mind with all the splendid experiences which make Hillebrand so versatile and (in your eyes!) so enviable, and - write your opera, although it is bound to be scandalously difficult to perform. - Who the devil made you a pedagogue? -
You see the radical mood I am in as a result of reading your letter: but - God knows! - I cannot simply stand by and do nothing. -
Incidentally, Dr Fuchs pleased me by quoting a passage from Overbeck which I found so admirable that I am once more devoting my attention to his essay. -
And by the way: full rehearsals (with orchestra) in Bayreuth in the summer of next year: performances in 1876. Not possible before then. -
I am now taking daily baths, since I couldn’t bear the pain in my lower abdomen any longer. You should do likewise! And eat meat! - Sincerest good wishes from
Yours faithfully,
R.W.
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 425