Highly revered friend,
You have made me very happy by the commission you intrusted to me, as it reminds me of the dear old days at Tribschen. At present, I have a great deal of time to devote to thoughts of the past, the remote as well as the immediate, as I am kept in a darkened room by an atropine cure found necessary upon my return. This autumn, following upon this summer, is more of an autumn for me than ever before, and I do not doubt that this is the case with many others. Back of the great events lies a streak of the blackest melancholy, and there seems to be no other way of rescuing one's self from this but by starting for Italy or by plunging into creative work—perhaps by combining the two.
When I picture you to myself in Italy, I always remember that it was there that you found the inspiration for the beginning of the Rheingold music. May it ever remain the land of beginnings for you! There you will be rid of the Germans for a time, and this seems to be necessary now and again, if one hopes to be able to do anything to help them.
Possibly you have heard that I am starting for Italy next month, but in my case it is not to be a land of beginnings, but one where I shall end my sufferings. These have again reached a climax, and it is the highest time for me to take this step. My school board knows full well what it is about in granting me a year's leave of absence, despite the sacrifice thereby entailed upon this little community. But had they not seen fit to open up this alternative to me, I should have been lost to them in an entirely different way. Thanks to my long-suffering disposition, I have clinched my teeth and endured agony upon agony during the last few years, and at times it seems as if I had been born into the world for this and nothing else. I have paid tribute in the fullest measure to the philosophy that teaches this long-suffering. My neuralgia goes to work as thoroughly and scientifically as if it were trying to probe and find out just what degree of pain I am able to endure, and thirty hours is required for each of these tests. I must count on a repetition of this research work every four or eight days, so you can see that, at least, I have the malady of a scholar. But . . . now the time has come when I can no longer endure it, and either I wish to live on in good health or not at all!
A complete rest, mild air, long walks, darkened rooms—all this I expect to find in Italy. I shudder at the thought of being obliged to see or hear anything while I am there. Please do not think that I am morose; it is not sickness but only human beings who are able to put me in a bad humor, and yet I am constantly surrounded by the most helpful and considerate of friends.
At first I had the moralist, Dr. Paul Rée, and now I have the musician Köselitz, who is writing this letter at my dictation. I must not forget Frau Baumgartner in enumerating my good friends, and possibly you will be interested to hear that a French translation of my last work (R. W. i. B.) from her hand will go to press next month.
Did the spirit descend upon me, I would put my good wishes for your journey into verse, but this stork has not built his nest in my neighbourhood of late, an oversight for which he may be pardoned. Therefore, please accept my heartfelt wishes as they are, and may they ever abide with you—with you and your revered wife, "my most noble friend," to make use of one of the most unpermissible Germanisms of the Jew Bernays.
As ever faithfully yours, Friedrich Nietzsche.
Source: The Nietzsche-Wagner Correspondence, ed. Elizabeth Foerster-Nietzsche, trans. Caroline V. Kerr (Boni and Liveright, 1921), No. 53