Dear Friend,
Here you have my will; now I can die — what I could still accomplish seems to me useless luxury! The last pages of this copy I have written in a state of mind that I cannot describe clearly to any one.
Our parrot — the most amiable creature, and most tenderly attached to me, the little talking, singing, whistling good spirit of my secluded little home — was of late often unwell; I had to get a veterinary surgeon, and then it gradually improved; I set to my work with such diligence that I forgot everything. On the day before the copy was finished, the poor thing so longed to come out to me that my wife could not resist, and brought it to me on my writing-table; it wished to sit at the window through which the sun was shining. I closed the curtains in order to be able to work: altogether it fidgeted me, and my wife had to take it away again: then it uttered that sad cry so well known to me. Afterwards it was agreed that I really ought to send for the surgeon. I said it won't be anything serious, and thought to myself: to-morrow you will finish your work, then you will go. Early the next morning it was suddenly dead.
Ah! if I could say to you what has died for me in this dear creature!!
It matters nothing to me whether I am laughed at for this. What I feel, I cannot help feeling; and I have no longer any inclination to do violence to my feelings; anyhow, I should have to write volumes to make clear to those disposed to laugh at me what such a small creature is and can become to a man who in everything is guided only by phantasy. Three days have passed, and still nothing can quiet me; and so it is with my wife: the bird was something indispensable between us and for us.
Dearest friend, I write briefly to you to-day! To be plain, I only wish the hateful manuscript out of my hands. I thank you heartily for your letter, which at first rather upset me. Do in everything what seems good to you! I am only concerned to get at least some money for this work, as I am still alive. By all means send the letter to Weber — it does not matter. I have as yet no further news. Do what you think fit, and I will thank you for everything.
If I could only take pleasure in life! Pleasure in art is not possible to me; be true and agree with me. In the whole wide world I have not an inch of ground on which I can present myself just as I am. Confound this quaver-life! All that I could expect from art-work seems to me just such phantastic self-quieting as that with which I used to silence myself in company with the little dead friend. I have nothing left to do but to vainly deceive myself.
Farewell for to-day. Do what you think right. I thank you for everything!
Farewell! Don't forget the R.'s! and greet your wife from me!
There will still be many faults in the manuscript. I have only been able to glance through it once.
[Musical example.]
The little pet had only just lately picked this up, and with unspeakable joy used to whistle it at me when I came home.
Source: Richard Wagner's Letters to His Dresden Friends, Theodor Uhlig, Wilhelm Fischer, and Ferdinand Heine, trans. J. S. Shedlock (Scribner & Welford, 1890), No. 22