Dear master,
In view of all that I have experienced of late, I have no right to be discouraged, for as a matter of fact, I live and move in a solar system of love and friendship, of comforting assurances and inspiring hopes. But, notwithstanding all this, there is one point which causes me a great deal of momentary uneasiness. Our winter semester has opened and I have no students at all. Our philologians have all remained away. It is really a humiliation for me, and one to be carefully concealed from the outside world. But to you, dear master, I have always confided everything and can, therefore, tell you this also. The state of affairs is not at all difficult to explain. I have suddenly been discredited among my philological colleagues, and our little university is obliged to suffer in consequence. This distresses me beyond measure, for I am really very devoted and deeply grateful and would not for the world have done anything to injure the interests of the institution. My philological colleagues, as well as Dean Fischer, are celebrating in a manner never before vouchsafed them in the whole course of their academic careers. Up until the last half-year, the number of students registered in the philological department was steadily on the increase—and now, all of a sudden, they are blown away as if by magic. All of this corresponds perfectly to things that have come to my knowledge concerning conditions at other universities. It goes without saying that Leipzig is fairly bursting with envy and conceit; every one condemns me, and even those "who know me" are unable to rise above a feeling of compassion for the "absurdity" I have committed. A professor of philology at the Bonn university, for whom I have never entertained a very high regard, settled the matter once for all with his students by pronouncing my book "absolute rubbish" of which nothing could be made; furthermore, that any one who would write such rubbish was "scientifically dead."
I have also heard of a student who intended coming to Basle, but was persuaded to remain in Bonn, and now has written to a relative here saying that he thanked God that he had been kept away from a university where I was teaching. In the face of all this antagonism, do you really believe that Rohde's generous deed will accomplish anything more than increase the hatred and jealousy already existing against us two? Rohde and I, most emphatically, expect nothing else. All this could be borne, however, were not the little university, which has shown me so much kindness and placed so much confidence in me, obliged to suffer on my account. This distresses me deeply, and will eventually lead to decisions which, for other reasons, I have already had under consideration for some time. By the way, I can make good use of this winter semester, now that I am nothing more than an ordinary school-master and obliged to fall back on pedagogy.
This, then, is the "dark point," but otherwise all is light and hope. I would be a morose mole, indeed, did not letters such as the one you have just written cause me to leap for joy. And you are really coming? I praise my lucky stars and the dentist, for I would never have dared dream of such a possibility. Would you not prefer to try the "Three Kings" this time? I consider it better than "Euler"; my sister and I took our meals there this summer and spent a very jolly day there with Fräulein von Meysenbug and the newly-wedded pair, Herzen-Monod.
Your splendid essay on Actors and Singers has again kindled in me the desire to have some one make a comprehensive review of your researches and conclusions in the field of æsthetics, and thereby show what radical changes have taken place in regard to artistic viewpoints—changes whereby these viewpoints have been deepened and intensified, so that practically nothing remains of the traditional theories of æsthetics.
I have also been devoting a great deal of thought (while on the Splügen) to the part choreography played in the structure of the Greek tragedy, and the relation existing between the plastic arts and the mimicry and grouping of the actors. In considering this question, it came to my mind what a striking example Æschylus has given us of the very thing of which you speak, namely, that even in our texts the symmetry of motion is suggested by the most marvellous metrical symmetry; and your tragedies awaken in me the glorious hope that herein will be found just the right standards, aims and canons necessary for the establishment of a genuinely German style of gesture and plastic realism. With a mind made receptive by the foregoing thoughts, I read your essay as if it were a revelation.
Then came Rohde's pamphlet. After having read it, was I not justified in asserting that I was in the right even to the smallest side issues? Nevertheless, it is extremely comforting to have this confirmed by a second person. There are times when one grows very distrustful of one's own efforts, especially when one is set upon by the entire profession. It distresses me to think what my poor friend must have suffered while thrashing around with such a "gang." It was only the thought of you, dear master, which sustained him and gave him strength and courage to persist in his task. We are now both very happy in having one and the same prototype—and do you not think that the world must envy me the possession of such a friend as Rohde?
By way of curiosity, I must tell you that I was recently approached by a musician who, while ostensibly asking my advice in regard to an operatic text, really had me in mind as the author of such a text. I wrote him a very wise epistle, strongly dissuading him from any such plan, but suggesting that he should try his hand at a cantata—perhaps make a new setting of Goethe's Walpurgisnacht, but a better one than Mendelssohn's! I am curious to know whether or not he will take my advice. But isn't the whole thing a great joke?
With the hope that during your pilgrimage through dear, disgraceful Germany you may meet with the same good fortune which attended you in Bayreuth, and in anticipation of your final wishes regarding your forthcoming visit to Basle, I close for today with a heartfelt farewell and auf Wiedersehen.
Source: The Nietzsche-Wagner Correspondence, ed. Elizabeth Foerster-Nietzsche, trans. Caroline V. Kerr (Boni and Liveright, 1921), No. 33