Wagner's Letters

Richard Wagner to Eliza Wille

May 2, 1864 · Stuttgart

Overview

Agreeing with Eliza Wille that he should not return to Mariafeld, Wagner asks to draw a veil over the "stormy night of fever" he spent there, mentions a doctor's recommendation of Cannes and his new acquaintances at Stuttgart, and assures her that his gratitude will never cool.

Letter

My very dear Friend,

I answer you briefly, because I have already said so much to you. Your wish, not to see me at Mariafeld again, concurs with my own feeling about it. Let us terminate that stormy night of fever, which even the loveliest sunshine out-of-doors refused to brighten, and draw a veil over the changeful pictures it brought forth. My immediate fate is still uncertain; but a doctor, whom I have consulted, recommends me Cannes: the Eckert family is amiable to me, and not unimportant consequences may flow from the acquaintance I have made with Baron Gall, Intendant of the Court-theatre here. We know that the Christian virtue Hope has mostly been my undoing whenever I have yielded to it. An opera-performance which I attended yesterday, for the first time since ever so long, put me mortally out of humour.

My sincerest greetings to your sister! You must both forgive me the unspeakable uneasiness I caused you, dear ladies.

I shall write to Wille, amicably informing him of my resolve to give up Mariafeld.

Please write to me, some day, from Hamburg: address to Stuttgart, c/o Kapellmeister Eckert.

Farewell, dear noble friend! Never will the warmth of my gratitude cool down: never! — From the bottom of my heart

Your

Richard Wagner.

Source: Richard Wagner's Letters to Wesendonck et al., trans. and indexed by William Ashton Ellis (Grant Richards, 1899), No. 57

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