My good Minna,
It gladdened me much to get your last letter yesterday! Ah, God, how afraid I was again, and looking toward your news, as ever, in wavering suspense! But you write me tranquilly and kindly: even Jacquot is merry again; yourself, you have done with your roving at present, and are in the position to await further developments in a supportable state without fresh wanderings in front of you. We may trust the permit will be granted to reside; you are lodging in the house of an old friend, who will look after you in case of need; you have old acquaintances in plenty, your seat in the theatre, and — above all that good Pusinelli, whose orders you now can follow for some time without intermission! God, my heart quite expands a bit, under it all; for, to know that you're somewhat calm again, or at least in a state of equilibrium, is so essential to myself in turn, if I'm to carry through my next decision; which certainly will keep me at a distance from you for a while again, but during whose execution I likewise hope to find complete repose, and in its result the means of becoming master of my own position. — So, what I have already hinted to you shall now be carried out! —
What I have suffered here in Vienna, is not to be described. Almost every week a fresh project to make Tristan still feasible this winter: every week a fresh disillusion. Ander discovered to be utterly shameful: a thorough ... wight, who has done me incredible harm by unscrupulous chatter. Enough, as the Director and everybody else at the theatre remained true to me, those plans were conceived to import Schnorr or Tichatscheck at once — whichever could get away the quickest: to arrive at finality, the whole thing was conducted at last per telegraph. Tichatscheck seems to think it quite impossible to get out of his starring engagement, even by paying damages; so I finally had to resign myself. It's now decided to engage Tichatscheck for my operas next winter; Salvi will come to Dresden himself on Monday — for Rienzi — and conclude with T. — The die accordingly is cast, and I have a full year before me to — wait. The Grand Duke of Baden has declined my request; with Berlin, through fishing enquiries of the Frommann and Pourtalès, I can arrive at nothing; Pourtalès got Hatzfeld to write me the other day that Berlin wasn't ripe yet, I had better wait. The only friendly token to occur to me has been Metternich's cordial invitation to occupy a quiet little room with my piano in his Paris Embassy hotel. By itself even that wouldn't have determined me; but — I no longer can endure this life, in which I'm quite dependent every day on outer influences, and have relish for no occupation, not even for reading; I feel I shall come to utter grief if I don't turn my hand to something that will snatch me altogether for a year — this fresh year of waiting — from a world so hostile to me. So the truly desperate nature of my situation has inspired me with a capital plan. I'm determined to give ear to nothing more, to abandon Tristan and the rest of it for the nonce, shut myself up in my room at the Austrian Embassy in Paris, and write a new opera so constituted that it shall go the round of all the German theatres next winter at one blow. It will be something quite different from what I've ever done before, neither requires a first-rate tenor nor a great prima donna, but can be cast with ease by any operatic company. The subject is highly original and thoroughly merry, which alone makes it possible for me to engage in it now, when a serious, sorrowful poem would do for me. Content yourself also with these hints, dear Mutz, for as soon as I conceived the first thought of this project of rescue I solemnly swore to myself to tell no one a word of it, but leave the whole world in completest uncertainty about my plan; which I fancy will be to my advantage. There is only one person I have had to tell; the one without whose aid I cannot carry out my plan: my new publisher Schott. He has just paid me the needful advances to enable me to get away from here, which — luckily! — has also made it possible for me to refuse a single gulden from the local management. (What a good thing that was, you may judge from the hounds having nevertheless written in the papers — on Ander's gossip — that I had received a solatium from the management by way of forfeit; which I've fortunately been able to contradict as a mendacity.) But Schott himself is pledged to preserve the fullest secrecy. Not before July is the textbook to be sent out to all the theatres, and the appearance of the full score announced for the beginning of October. I am now on the point of binding myself by a strict contract with Schott to deliver the finished poem on the 1st of January, and a finished act of the score every 3 months thereafter. Heaven grant that nothing may interrupt me! This time I hope for complete undisturbedness, to which you can contribute so very much by constant good news of yourself. For the rest, Schott must keep paying me the needful advances, so that alike for the present, during work, and probably for another year after, I shall want money from nobody. Consequently I have also written to the Frommann and the Grand Duchess, earnestly dissuading them from any step to obtain me pecuniary relief in Berlin; everything of that sort would only turn out trivial, and compromising to me now. On the other hand they are both to do their best to extract for me the following in course of time: a summons to conduct Lohengrin, a reading to the Court, commission for the Nibelungen. People must make acquaintance with my personal abilities; when all the rest will follow. — Accordingly I leave them time for that — that's the chief thing, time to reflect — whilst I shall be drawing all men's eyes to me again by a new and uncommonly popular work. What do you say to it?
See, Mutz, so I'm taking the reins into my own hand at last; it was impossible to hold out any longer, and everyone was regularly plotting for my downfall. But I am going a step farther: if a few good tenors don't turn up at last, I have another new subject in store, a more serious one, for which I also need no heroic tenor, but the principal role is high bass, which is to be had everywhere, for instance quite excellently here itself (Beck). Then I shall write this work as well and then find out at last what I've effected. Enough: without taking up works that at once afford me pleasure and the possibility of their rapid circulation, I should have succumbed now. —
Now then: help me yourself, Mutz! Take a thorough rest for this year, until next autumn — while I keep myself shut up for work. You shall lack nothing, be entirely free from care, and have everything you wish. As soon as agreeable to you, I'll get whatever furniture you specify despatched from Paris; so make yourself comfortable, and set up provisional house for a year. When I've finished my opera, I shall have a roving life of it again, be obliged to go hither and thither, and probably not get much rest myself awhile: we shall see each other often; you'll come when I produce my comic opera — perhaps at Munich first, and wherever else it may be. But we won't take a fixed habitation for the pair of us before I obtain a solid appointment with good salary; which won't and cannot fail to come — according to my plan — for prudent and dignified waiting. — Then, my good Minna, — on the day of entering our last logis, we then will celebrate our silver and our golden wedding both together, won't we? So — patience, patience to-day! We shall be repaid for it. No tears, then, no grumbling! For to-day let us simply glide over it, to fix our eyes the firmer on a certain goal! Courage, courage! You see how it has returned to myself. Peace to your heart! Tend yourself, get strong and gentle! All will come right! Many greetings and kisses from
Thy good Husband.
Source: Richard to Minna Wagner: Letters to His First Wife, trans. William Ashton Ellis, Vol. 2 (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1909), No. 219