Dearest Friend,
The answer to your letter — or rather, proposal — really demanded a little reflection. I have no word to say against whatever method the Mannheim Verein deems best to serve with energy the object for which it was founded: in any case, as it was the first to call the idea of W.-Vereins into life, it is only meet that it should take the initiative, and no one can dispute with it the honour of being the pioneer in this affair. Only, be careful in your boasts about myself: we cannot refer to Chicago and London so unconditionally; in both cities a new theatre had already been built, and — to be sure — if I had consented to take the thing into my personal hands, it would have been fitted up according to my wishes, also the performers engaged according to my choice. That was for my operas in general. But now we come to the crucial point: in Berlin a "Wagneriana" had been formed, with 220,000 thlr. already underwritten, and the prospect of a million for me, if I would transfer Bayreuth — (with modifications) to Berlin; the same thing would have been infinitely easier in Vienna, for itself, than to get subscriptions there for Bayreuth. It thus is not demonstrable that people would not have built my theatre in a large German capital too, and the crux accordingly resides in my having cast my eye on a neutral spot with an undertaking for the whole German public, not the mere public of one capital. Cities like Chicago, and so on, could perhaps be found in Germany as well, but not the German public.
As to ventilating a subscription, however, it would perhaps be more advisable that this should be started by a consortium of influential men from the various German centres. Here my hands are already tied a little, as a rich and energetic Hamburg merchant (Zacharias, Fontenay 1 — or 2 — Hamburg) proposes to convoke such a preliminary meeting for the 15th October. Would you not place yourself in correspondence with him? I am sure that he also would like to address himself to you.
If you proceed to a manifesto (which might have a very good effect), I would really beg you to ask the advice of Nietzsche at Bâle in its composition; in any case you might approach him at once, to draft you such a manifesto. In this regard I have quite especial confidence in him — in him of all others.
Well, we shall see!
A "Max Pauer" of Steyermark (Schloss Gutentag) wrote me a few days back that he was sending you 200 thlr. to supplement the portion of his patronat-voucher — taken up through you. Has he done so?
I am tired, God knows, but heartily do I greet yourself and all of yours.
Your faithful
Richard Wagner.
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner to Emil Heckel, with a Brief History of the Bayreuth Festivals, trans. William Ashton Ellis (Grant Richards, 1899), No. 39