My oldest and most esteemed Friend!
How could you give me greater pleasure than by the good news that the preparations for the Mannheim performance of the Ring are progressing so satisfactorily!
If one takes a closer view of the situation, it seems like a miracle! Fate has taken its own course with my works; even though it is not the one which I originally had in view, it behooves me to look on quite soberly and calmly and see what can be accomplished for my cause in this way.
This is my standpoint: I look on from a distance, rejoice over good results, and am not astonished at bad. But—I can never again be present. If you ever learn that I have ever been present at the performance of a part of that work, you will be at liberty to accuse me of treacherous friendship, but such a thing will never happen.
Therefore my most sincere thanks for the kind invitation to Mannheim, which I beg you also to convey to the esteemed gentlemen of the Grand Ducal Theatre committee.
Filled with the most agreeable memories of your zeal for my work and its execution, I am and remain
Yours most faithfully,
Richard Wagner.
Source: The Story of Bayreuth as Told in the Bayreuth Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Caroline V. Kerr (Small, Maynard and Company, 1912), No. 112