Since last All Souls' Eve the Master has seen Death again—this time as a kind benefactor.
A little while ago I went to look up Berlioz. I met him just coming to his own door, in a wretched state of health. He had just had electric treatment as a last attempt to combat his nervous disease. He told me of his sufferings and how, from the moment of waking, they increase upon him. I recognised my own pains and the sources which tend to increase them unbearably, prominent among which I reckon the incredible demands on the nerves—entirely unknown to other men—made by conducting and other passionate expositions of one's art. I realised that I should have been in even worse case than Berlioz if I imposed these exertions upon myself at all frequently, for I feel that, as it is, they have an increasingly ravaging effect on my health. In Berlioz's case, unfortunately, the stomach is already very much affected, and—trivial as it may sound—Schopenhauer is quite right when he names a sound digestion as, among other things, of outstanding importance in the physiological equipment of a genius. By extraordinary moderation I have kept this particular requisite in fairly serviceable condition in my own case, but in Berlioz's sufferings I foresaw my own probable destiny and left the poor fellow in an apprehensive frame of mind.
I still had half Tannhäuser to go through with my Frenchmen. The strain was great, bitter mental emotions predominating. Next day came a slight error of diet [...] and thereupon a real attack of illness which suddenly prostrated me. [...]
I am still not quite well again (what is called well!), but I will give you the latest news. The "dramatic idyll" at Karlsruhe is finished and done with. Devrient relieved me of the pain of having to refuse his singer [Garrigues], she herself having declared that she is not equal to the Isolde. It may rest at that, then. In any case the whole Tristan adventure is postponed indefinitely, and the door stands much wider open again for other approaching chances. [...]
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner, Vol. 2, selected and ed. Wilhelm Altmann, trans. M. M. Bozman (J. M. Dent & Sons, 1927), No. 439