Wagner and his Isolde

The 1905 translation of Wagner's intense letters to the poet Mathilde Wesendonck, muse for one of his greatest operas.

Gustav Kobbé (Author)

9781108078559, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 13 November 2014

288 pages, 7 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 1.7 cm, 0.37 kg

The German poet Mathilde Wesendonck (1828–1902), author of the texts of the Wesendonck Lieder, was the wife of Wagner's patron, the wealthy silk merchant Otto Wesendonck. From 1852 until 1858, the Wagners lived next to the Wesendoncks in Zurich and an intense relationship developed between Wagner and Mathilde, subsequently reflected in the impossible love at the heart of his opera Tristan und Isolde. Prepared by the American musicologist Gustav Kobbé (1857?1918), who provides a helpful connecting narrative, this 1905 translation of a selection of 'the most intimate and striking' of Wagner's impassioned letters to Mathilde charts the course of the opera's creation. Written between 1853 and 1863, the letters show Wagner thinking aloud not only about Tristan but also the planning of Parsifal. As Mathilde's letters to Wagner were destroyed, the exact nature of their relationship and of her inspiration musically will never be fully established.

Author's note
1. Tristan und Isolde in real life
2. A lovely exile in Venice
3. The moan of a breaking heart
4. An intermezzo at Lucerne
5. Vicissitudes in Paris
6. Such stuff as dreams are made of.

Subject Areas: Classical music [c 1750 to c 1830 AVGC4]