My Dear Friend,
I have a headache and don't feel quite well, but I can no longer delay answering your very kind and comforting letter. Believe me, people of our sort are really frail plants which require much warmth, and what could be more "warming" than such agreeable advances as yours? I have few friends, because I quite lack the faculty of acquiring them: I am little able to win friends — my "good star" must bestow them upon me. There is, however, a certain "look" by which one knows a friend — it sometimes needs merely the calling of one another by name, and the thing is done. And in this way all good luck comes — who therefore would be doubtful of your faith? Let us both abide by this and be friends for life!
And truly, I have Heaven to thank if real friends are now to be known! I have finally arrived at that turning-point of my life which we call — good fortune: whether I have achieved this place easily or amid a thousand troubles, no one will care, and most people to whom this fortune has led me will not fail to grudge me it. I see before me clearly and I realize, almost with pain, how guarded I must be and how carefully I must watch my actions every day. But that is so very repugnant! My impulses always come from my heart, and so I should like to feel free of this care. Oh, if people only knew how much these troubles spoil the pure core of an artist's life! Our necessity of being an artist and a sharp fellow at the same time certainly deprives the world of many an innocent work of beauty. — To find real joy in this so-called good fortune, I must now gain friends, and indeed the kind who will be like you: the number of these will not be great — and that is just what is beautiful about it! You remain true to me — and to you my inner self shall ever be revealed!
Your letter was also the only pleasant and delightful thing that I have experienced here — thus you can see that without you — my friend — I would have met only with things either of no concern or else actually disagreeable. The weather for the most part has been bad, and I have not felt my best. I am drinking the Marienbader Kreuz mineral water, as you advised me to do: at first it agreed well with me, but then for some reason — whether unknowingly I have made a mistake in my diet or have harmed myself in some other way — on the day before yesterday and yesterday, my sickness set in again as severely as ever. I think that I am not quiet enough, but always distracted and irritable.
Breitkopf and Härtel have informed me that happy as they were to agree on my offer of the Flieg. Holländer for publication, they were, after considering my terms — I had asked for 1,000 thalers (including the grand piano) — renouncing the matter for the time being. I replied that it was incomprehensible to me how they could be prepared to risk a not insignificant amount of capital on an enterprise and yet shy at its purchase-price, which was no greater than customary and one which Breitkopf and Härtel have often already paid; and that until this — or perhaps a still higher price later on — proved acceptable to them, I should not renew my offer. And that is my firm resolve, to abide by which, fortunately, I shall be supported by my secure position, since I can, on the strength of a little sacrifice, settle myself to the point of waiting, quietly and without further denial, until I have no further need of selling my operas at far below their worth. — So you see how matters stand regarding that which was born in our Dresden!
In other respects, I have for the most part heard nothing but absurdities, which put me in a bad humour; an exception to this was a letter which I received from Riga, in which someone reported the impression my Flieg. Holländer had made on him, whence I perceive that it produced exactly the effect which it was my intention for it to do.
My Tannhäuser is resting peacefully; I have little urge to disturb it; it is true that I have begun the composition, but it is not worth while speaking of it! I lack two things: peace and — such must I call it! — comfort. I do not feel comfortable, that is, there is no inward or outward harmony about my feelings: I am distracted and I long for rest — not, however, the rest of an idler, but on the contrary, a concentrated restlessness: I do not wish to have to think of all sorts of things, but only of a few. Many years, however, will still have to elapse before I attain this harmonious peace, for I have ten years of my past to make up for. — Nevertheless, I am looking forward with pleasure to the coming winter: certainly, I hope to be able to satisfy at least my longing for external comfort, and that is worth much, after all, because external discomfort can torment one to the very marrow.
There, I have chattered away like a real egoist, as if I truly were a "capital fellow"! That's the way it is, we are always so shockingly concerned with ourselves! — Indeed, you have written me about so many other matters which I should have discussed: let me acknowledge your news regarding the painful consequences of the Choral Festival without any special comment in reply: I only find it annoying that no wiser person reported it in the Leipz. mus. Zeitsch. — could you not have furnished a better musical notice? — Give my best greetings to our friends of the Liedertafel: soon we shall make music together again! In the next few days I shall myself write to, and on behalf of, Heine: should you chance to see him, tell him that I reproach him very much for not having let me know of the serious crisis which he is now facing; I should be much concerned if he were to leave Dresden!
On Thursday week I intend to set out for Prague and on the 15th or 16th arrive again in Dresden. Shall I find you still in Dresden, or shall you already have set out for Teplitz? Write me regarding this, so that in a last event I can greet you here! What a pity that you are unable to come now!
My wife and I thank you for your kind regards and those of your wife, and we heartily return them.
Let us rejoice chiefly in anticipation of the coming winter! — And now once more my sincerest thanks for your cheering letter! I am entirely and truly yours.
Richard Wagner
Zur Eiche — Schönau, near Teplitz
Oh, still another request! Will you kindly tell our mail-carrier to forward to Teplitz all letters arriving up to August 12, but to bring newspapers to you? Then will you be good enough to see whether these contain anything of interest to me, in which case they may be able to go to me by mail: if this is not the case, will you please keep them until my return?
R. W.
Source: The Letters of Richard Wagner to Anton Pusinelli, trans. and ed. Elbert Lenrow (Alfred A. Knopf, 1932), No. 1