Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Richard Wagner, by John F.
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Title: Richard Wagner Composer of Operas
Author: John F. Runciman
Release Date: August 4, 2005 [EBook #16431]
Language: English
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RICHARD WAGNER
COMPOSER OF OPERAS
BY
JOHN F. RUNCIMAN
LONDON G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. 1913

TO HAROLD HODGE

INTRODUCTION
It is now one hundred years since Richard Wagner was born, thirty
since he died. In every land he has his monument in one shape or
another; his music-dramas can be heard all the world over; all the
ancient controversies as to their merits or demerits have died down.
The Bayreuth theatre, the outward and visible sign of his inner
greatness, has risen to the point of its most splendid glory and lapsed
into the limbo of tenth-rate things. Every one who really cares for the
art of music, and especially the art of opera (of which art music is by
far the most important factor), has had ample time and opportunity for
making up his mind. It is, therefore, high time to simplify and to cease
from elaborating. In this book will be found, I trust, no special pleading,
no defence or extenuation, no preposterous eulogy on the one hand, and
on the other no vampire work, but a plain and concise attempt to depict
the mighty artist as he lived and to describe his artistic achievement as
it is. We have all had time to consider and to sort out (so to say) the
reams that have been written and printed about Wagner: the bulk of it
has had to be thrown on the scrap-heap: what there was of value has, I
hope, been utilised.
An author who plans a book on an artist or an artistic question must be
wary, especially at the beginning of his adventure. To start away with a
theory, whether new or old, and to yield to the seductive temptation to
convince humanity of its truth--this is to lay a trap and to take the path
that leads straight into it. Theories should be kept for scientific matters.
A work proving that parallel straight lines never meet need not land the
writer in self-contradictions; and another writer may prove that they
must and do meet, and still avoid getting tangled amongst his own
arguments. I even read a book once in which it was clearly shown that
the earth was flat; and, granted a ludicrous premise, one could but
admire the irrefragable logic with which the conclusion was reached.
With regard to art, be your premises sound or grotesque, the result is

the same--muddle. Logic, science, philosophy, applied to art, spell
certain disaster. With mingled pain and amusement I have noted how
more than one writer on music, setting out in triumphant high spirits to
demonstrate this or that, has before his third chapter demonstrated just
the contrary: I have never seen anything else occur.
Wagner wrote so much about himself and his art, and appeared so fully
satisfied with his explanations of why he became just what he became
and of why his art was just what it was, that naturally for nearly a
generation his critics fell into one or other of two errors. Either they
accepted his theorisings unreservedly or as unreservedly they rejected
them. In the second case they had to face the difficulty of coining,
shaping, a theory of their own; in either case shipwreck nearly always
promptly ensued; and on the whole, if Wagner had to be theorised
about, one would prefer to have it done by Wagner. He himself knew
the tiny value of his theorisings about his art, for he declared that when
he wrote Tristan and Isolda he found he had already left his theories far
behind. This discovery might well have served as a warning both to
Wagner and to the hosts of his commentators. Unluckily Wagner was
far too fond of theorising, moralising and generally talking of himself
and his works, and he reckoned he had a big propagandist work to do;
so he went on scribbling to the end. As for the commentators, they
neglected the warning and took Wagner's later doings as an example,
with the result that the library shelves of Europe are stopped and
blocked with as big a heap of rubbish as ever was provoked by great
works of art since the world