Chapter 5

PARIS

I

The late Sir Charles Hallé, probably retailing a story he had heard, relates in his reminiscences that when Heine heard of a young German musician coming from Russia to Paris to try his luck with an empty pocket, a half-finished opera and a few introductions from Meyerbeer--amongst them one to a bankrupt theatre--he clasped his hands and raised his eyes to heaven, in silent adoration before such unbounded and naïve self-confidence; and probably he had not then learnt the whole truth of the matter. The journey from Riga, _via_ the Russian frontier into Germany, and thence by Pillau, the Baltic, the North Sea, London, the Channel and Boulogne, is surely the maddest, most fantastic dream ever turned into a reality. That he turned the dream into a reality shows how completely Wagner's character was now formed: in no essential does the Wagner who built Bayreuth in the 'seventies differ from the Wagner of '39. He had unshakable tenacity of purpose and perfect faith in his own genius; he was absolutely sure he could accomplish the impossible; he took the wildest risks. As a creative artist his development had just begun; but the qualities which were in after years to enable him to force his creations on an indifferent world were all there, ripe and strong.

The problem of getting away from Russia was by no means simple, but may be passed over in a few words. Wagner's income in Riga had not been large--300 roubles--and it had been mostly swallowed up by his German creditors; and even in the town he managed to owe money. ("Was ever poet so trusted?" asked Dr. Johnson, referring to Goldsmith). Had he given notice of his intended departure his Riga creditors could have stopped him; so when the company returned to Riga after their annual summer series of representations in Mittau Wagner did not return. He made what is, I believe, called a "bee-line" for the frontier, met there a friend, one Möller, who helped him to dodge the sentries and patrols, and in a few days reached Arnau. Very little later, in July 1839, he, Minna and Robber the dog took ship at Pillau and set sail for England. The date is one of the most memorable in the lives of the musicians--quite as worthy of remembrance as the day on which Haydn boarded the packet at Calais. Haydn's powers had been ripened in the sunshine of Mozart's genius, but it is doubtful whether, save for England, the twelve great symphonies would have been written; Wagner's powers were beginning to ripen, but it is hardly doubtful that the _Dutchman_ would never have been written but for the voyage to England.

If he could have afforded it he probably would have travelled to Paris by land. But travelling by land was quite out of the question; money was then, as ever, scarce with Richard, and he realized that the longest way round was the shortest--nay, the only--way there. He had over three weeks of life on the ocean wave, and did not like it and had no reason to like it. Uproarious storms raged unceasingly; the ship was driven amongst the Norwegian crags for shelter; and the gloom of these black, forbidding sea-precipices and fiords took possession of his soul, mixing and giving pictorial shape to the weird old legend of the phantom sailor doomed for ever to wander on the grey seas. Glasenapp points out in an admirable passage that Sandwike, where Daland goes ashore, is the name of the place where Wagner's ship put in and he and the crew were regaled by a lonely miller with rum. There is no rum in the _Dutchman_, but the atmosphere, terror and mystery of the seas and rocky fiords of Norway are all there; and it was these that inspired the _Dutchman_. He knew the tale in Heine's form of it, and had thought of adapting it; but it was the sea gave the idea birth in his imagination: without the sea the _Dutchman_ is inconceivable. The _Dutchman_, the whole of the _Ring_ and the _Mastersingers of Nuremberg_ are all operas in which the scenic environment is the inspiration. Depend upon it, ere the ship had freed the Sound, and got into the comparative safety of the open North Sea, the _Dutchman_ legend had formed itself in his mind ready for dramatic treatment.

Ultimately--to be precise, three and a half weeks after getting on board--the family reached London, all three spent with sea-sickness and want of food. They needed and took a rest, first staying near the Tower and then in Soho. There is nothing to relate of Wagner's experiences during his first London visit, save the episode of his lost dog. The late Mr. Dannreuther got the story wrong and has since been faithfully followed by biographers in saying the dog was away several days, and on his return was hugged nearly to death by his master; but in _My Life_ Wagner says the animal was lost for only a few hours. But as he was intensely fond of animals all his life--he always had two or three about him--the incident must have impressed him. Anyhow, when he next came to London, fifteen years after, he mentioned it to Mr. Dannreuther, and also pointed out to him where he had lived and the points of interest he had seen. But nothing of the slightest significance occurred, and soon he started for Paris by way of Boulogne. When he reached Boulogne he stayed there a month for the sake of the sweet company of Meyerbeer--which seems not a little funny to-day.

Wagner was only twenty-six years of age; like a rustic who has suddenly been carried out of the dullness and darkness of his village into some tawdry café of the town, and is dazzled and mistakes the gilt wood for solid gold, so had Wagner been filled with admiration by Meyerbeer's brilliant shoddy. It must be admitted that for sheer theatricalism that gentleman beat any composer who preceded him. Bellini's, Auber's and Spontini's scores are thin compared with his; even Auber's grandest ensembles lack his sham magnificence. Wagner's artistic conscience had not ripened to the point at which conscience is an absolute, unfailing, unerring touchstone. He had been impressed with Meyerbeer's showiness and superficial sparkle: it had not yet occurred to him to test the music with the touchstone of truth. It is not at all hard for me to believe that he had at this time a sincere admiration for the Jewish autocrat of the opera world. He was passing through that stage: he had not yet passed through it; in scheming _Rienzi_ he had started, so to speak, with an immense rush to follow Meyerbeer, and for some time the momentum acquired in that first rush kept him going. When disillusionment came--well, we shall see.

He was an obscure German kapellmeister, and had never been conductor in a theatre which did not suffer bankruptcy or where something worse did not occur. Meyerbeer had certainly never heard his name, and Wagner was aware of his: he had heard of Meyerbeer's name, and even if he had not admired the musician he cannot at that period have been insensible to the man's supremacy in the opera trade. And when we add to this latter fact, the other fact, that he _did_ admire the musician, it is easy to understand the feelings with which he approached this emperor of the barren Sahara of opera. To the emperor he got an introduction--whether or not in the way Praeger relates is not worth inquiring into--and the emperor received him not merely with courtesy, but with what appears to have been something a great deal warmer than courtesy. He hearkened to the two finished acts of _Rienzi_, and beginning with an expression of admiration for the beautiful clear handwriting, presently grew interested in the music and ended by commending it heartily. Wagner departed for Paris with the autocrat's letters in his pocket and, as I have said, little money, but a breast packed with glorious hopes. The most successful opera-composer of the day had declared that he would succeed, and guaranteed his belief by giving him those precious introductions. One was to the direction of the Grand opera, one to Joly, director of the Renaissance Theatre, another to Schlesinger, the publisher, another again to Habeneck, the director of the Conservatoire. Of these the letter to Habeneck proved useful to Wagner from the artistic point of view; that to Schlesinger useful pecuniarily. The others were useless, and were never meant to be of any service. Had Meyerbeer told Wagner to go back to Germany it is just possible Wagner might have gone. Instead, Meyerbeer sent him into a _cul de sac_--to starve, or get out as he best could. In the whole history of the art of the world no more cruel swindle was ever played on an obscure artist by a man occupying a brilliant position.

For, figuratively, Wagner had not been in Paris twenty minutes before he discovered that to be presented by the omnipotent Meyerbeer meant nothing--absolutely nothing. Every one received him with the greatest politeness; every one appeared to promise great things; no one did anything. At the opera he had not the remotest chance, of course, being young, unknown, a German, and without social influence. The Renaissance speedily shut its doors, being bankrupt. Through Habeneck he learnt to understand the Ninth Symphony even better than he had understood it before; for the Conservatoire orchestra had rehearsed it until, almost unconsciously, they discovered the real melody, or what Wagner calls the melos. This is a question I shall go into later when dealing with Wagner's own conducting; for the present it suffices to mention the bare fact, as we can trace directly to these performances--or, rather, rehearsals--the _Faust_ overture which Wagner soon afterwards composed. Habeneck gave a performance of his _Columbus_ overture; and in no other way was the acquaintance of any value. So, as his little money was speedily gone, he had to live for a while on what his relatives and friends could give him, and afterwards by what he could earn by writing for Schlesinger's _Gazette Musicale_. This is what Meyerbeer's introductions were worth.

II

However, he found and made friends, some, though not all, as poor as himself. Laube, his crony of earlier years, was there and introduced him to Friedrich Pecht, a student of painting, and to Heine. This last was very suspicious of Wagner at first, because he did not believe Meyerbeer would exert himself on behalf of any one possessing the slightest ability. It is obvious that he soon discovered that he was both right and wrong. Wagner had ability, and Meyerbeer, far from helping him, had ingeniously dug a trap to keep a possible rival quiet. Wagner made the acquaintance of Berlioz, and promptly uttered the criticism he adhered to always--one that I humbly subscribe to--that Berlioz, with all his imagination, energy and wealth of orchestral resource, had no sense of beauty. Berlioz, he remarked, lived in Paris "with nothing but a troop of devotees around him, shallow persons without a spark of judgment, who greet him as the founder of a brand-new musical system, and completely turn his head." To a certain degree this judgment came home to roost in Wagner's later years in Bayreuth; but he was saved by the fact that, being a great musician, he also drew genuine musicians to him. If Bayreuth was crowded by strange beings of low intelligence who bowed low before Richard and found the weirdest meanings in his simplest melodies, and who now write lengthy books about Richard's son Siegfried, yet we must remember that the men who carried the news of Richard's true greatness through Europe were Liszt, Bülow, Tausig, Jensen, Cornelius and many smaller men--smaller men, but real musicians. Now, it was long since pointed out that amongst his entourage Berlioz had no one possessing an understanding of the art of music. Literary men and painters were there in abundance: that is, they called on him; and because his musical ideas or ideas for music seemed so vast they assumed that his musicianship must be vast also; but those whose judgment would have been trustworthy, and whose help worth having, stayed away altogether; and when the celebrated personages had paid their call and gone their several ways he was left to the flattery of a pack of incompetent fools. This is not to exaggerate--it is simply to explain the loneliness and sad tragedy of the end of Berlioz's life. He must in his heart have known the bitter truth. One friend of Wagner's must not be omitted--Lehrs. From him Wagner obtained what is called the middle high-German _Sängerkrieg_, from which he extracted ere returning to Germany the whole world of _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_; and this we must consider later. We may note that his youngest sister Cäcilie, Geyer's only child, had married Avenarius, who resided in Paris for a time as agent for Brockhaus, the Leipzig publisher.

III

The whole story of this first visit to Paris is sordid, squalid, miserable to a degree; and I don't know that we can be surprised. When Wagner sailed from Pillau he had not had a single work of any importance performed. Nay, more, he had not written a work of any importance. _Die Feen_ had never been given; _Das Liebesverbot_ had been given--under ridiculous circumstances and with the most disastrous results; his symphony had been played, but by this time score and parts had probably disappeared. Mendelssohn had received them in Leipzig and never once referred to them. Anyhow, none of these things were striking enough to have attracted much attention even in Germany; and they certainly would have excited no interest in busy, bustling Paris--the home of the Rossini and Meyerbeer opera, of quadrilles, vaudevilles and the rest. But for the happy, or rather unhappy, chance of meeting Meyerbeer in Boulogne, he would have entered the city without a line to any one of position. His money, as I have just said, gave out almost at once, and thenceforth he had to keep the wolf from the door by slaving at any odd jobs which would bring in a few pence. On more than one occasion he was reduced, literally, to his last penny. With marvellous resiliency of spirits he managed not only to pull through, but to complete _Rienzi_, then to write one great opera and begin planning two very great ones. We have accounts--mostly written long after the event--of merry meetings and suppers; but against them we must set the dozens of despairing letters and scribbled notes in which he complains of his luck and his lot. Yet, I say, how can we feel surprise? Why, he could not even play the piano well enough to give an opera-director any fair notion of his music; and perhaps that is just as well, so far as Paris was concerned, for the taste of the day was such that the better his compositions were understood the less they were liked. Hallé remarks that when he talked of his operatic dreams at this time he was commonly regarded as being a little, or more than a little, "off his head."

It became evident at the outset that all hopes anent the opera must fall to the ground. He met Scribe, the omnipotent libretto-monger of the day, and of course nothing came of it. The spectacle of _Rienzi_ was on far too large a scale for the work to be possible at the Renaissance, so, much against the grain, he offered Anténor Joly _Das Liebesverbot_. He waited two months for a decided refusal or a qualified acceptance, but heard nothing. At last a word from Meyerbeer seemed to have settled the matter. One Dumersau, who translated the words into French, was very enthusiastic about the music and made Joly enthusiastic too; everything looked bright for the moment, and Wagner moved from the slum where he had been living to an abode a little less slum-like, in the Rue du Helder. On the day he moved the Renaissance went bankrupt again. I say again, because Joly became bankrupt punctually every three months--a fact which explains Meyerbeer's readiness to help him in that quarter. In desperation he seized the chance of earning a little money by writing the music for a vaudeville production, _La Descente de la Courtille;_ but here again his luck was out: a more practised hand took the job from him. He composed what he considered simple songs adapted to the Parisian taste, and they were found too complicated and difficult to sing. To earn mere bread he arranged the more popular numbers of popular operas for all sorts of instruments and combinations of instruments, and in one of his notes we find him bewailing the sad truth that even this work was coming to an end for a time. However, he wrote on for Schlesinger's _Gazette Musicale_; for Lewald's _Europa_ (German) and the Dresden _Abendzeitung_--though the work for the second two did not commence till later on. This toil perhaps brought him bread: it did nothing more; Minna had to pawn her trifles of jewellery; there seemed not a ray of hope gleaming on the horizon. The performance of his old _Columbus_ overture did him a precious deal of good--especially as at the second performance--at a German concert arranged by Schlesinger--the brass were so frightfully out of tune that people could not make out what it was the composer would be at. It is needless to tell the ten times told miserable tale in further detail at this time of day; and I will now confine myself to the few facts that bear upon the fuller life that soon was to open before him.

IV

A new opera-house had been a-building in Dresden, a royal court theatre; and a chance in Paris being denied to _Rienzi_, Wagner, staggering along under the burden of his crushing woes, thought perhaps his grand spectacular work would be the very thing to suit the Dresdeners about the time of the opening. True, there remained three acts to compose and orchestrate--but what was that to a Richard Wagner! Only one other composer has achieved such astounding feats. Mozart, amidst multitudinous worries, sat down and wrote his three glorious symphonies "as easily as most men write a letter." Wagner was born to achieve the impossible: he had already done it in getting to Paris at all; and now, as a sheer speculation, on the very off-chance of a Saxon court theatre accepting a work by a Saxon composer, harassed by creditors, despondent under repeated disappointments, drudging hours a day at hack-labour, he went to work and composed and instrumentated the last three acts of the most brilliant opera that had been written up to that date--1841. On February 15 of that year he began; on November 19 he ruled the last double-bar and wrote finis. That done, he dispatched the complete score and a copy of the words to Dresden, with a letter to von Lüttichau, the intendant. Again the delays seemed interminable; his letters, especially those to Fischer and Heine, are packed with inquiries about the fate of his opera--he could get no answer at all for a long while, and after it was definitely accepted the usual troubles occurred through the whims and caprices of singers. Even his idol and divinity, Schröder-Devrient, great artist though she was on the stage, played the very prima donna--which is about as bad a thing as can be said of any woman--off the stage so far as _Rienzi_ was concerned. Being a prima donna first and an artist afterwards, she thought nothing of dashing Wagner's hopes by expressing a desire to appear in some other opera before _Rienzi_; and as the delay meant a prolongation of the actual misery and possible starvation at Paris we can picture Wagner's impotent rage and despair.

On October 14, 1841, we find him writing to Heine:

"... Herr von Lüttichau has definitely consented to my opera being put on the stage after Reissiger's. That is all very good; but how many questions does not this answer suggest! For instance: does the general management propose to place my work upon the stage with the outlay indispensable to a brilliant effect? On this point W----writes me: 'The general management will leave nothing undone to equip your opera in a suitable manner.' You will understand how terribly terse this seems to me! I am not greatly surprised at receiving no letter from Reissiger since last March: he has worked for me--that is the best and most honourable answer; besides, it would be foolish on my part to expect that Reissiger, now that his own opera must be fairly engrossing his attention, should be much occupied about me. But what alarms me is the absolute silence of our Devrient! I think I have already written a dozen letters to her: I am not exactly surprised at her sending me no single line in answer, because one knows how terrible a thing letter-writing is to many people. But that she has never even indirectly sent me a word, nor let me have a hint, makes me downright uneasy. Good heavens! So much depends upon her--it would really be a mere humanity on her part if she, perhaps through her lady's-maid, had sent me a message to this effect: 'Make your mind easy! I am taking an interest in your affair!'--certainly everything which I have learnt here and there about her behaviour with regard to me gives me every reason to feel comfortable; for instance, she is said to have declared some while ago in Leipzig that she hoped my opera would be brought out in Dresden. This token would have fully quieted me, if it had only come directly to my ears or eyes: hearsay, however, is far too uncertain a thing.

"A month ago I likewise wrote to her, and earnestly begged her to let me have only a line with the name of the lady-singer whom she would like to be cast for the part of Irene, so that I might make a formal list to propose to the management. No answer! Oh, my best Herr Heine, if your kindness would only allow you a few words in which to make me acquainted with the intentions of the adored Devrient! Does she really wish to sing in my opera?--that is the question.

"Good heavens! only to know how all this stands! I have written to Herr Tichatschek, and commended myself to his amiability: shall I be able to count on this gentleman?"

Again, on January 4 of the following year:

"Should it really come to this, that my opera must be laid aside for the whole winter, I should indeed be inconsolable; and he or she who might be to blame for this delay would have incurred a grave responsibility--perhaps for causing me untold sufferings. I cannot write to Madame Devrient; for that I am much too excited, and I know too well that my letters make no impression upon her. But if I have not yet worn out your friendly feeling toward me, and if I can be assured that you rely upon my fullest gratitude, I earnestly beg of you to go to Madame Devrient. Tell her of my astonishment at the news that it is she who hinders my opera from at length appearing; and that I am in the highest degree disturbed to learn that she by no means feels that pleasure in and sympathy for my work which so many flattering assurances had led me to believe. Give her an inkling of the misery she would prepare for me, if (as I have now good reason to fear) a performance of _Rienzi_ could not after all take place this year! But what am I saying? Though you may be the most approved friend of Madame Devrient, even you will not have much influence over her. Therefore, I do not know at all what I should say, what I must do, or what advise! My one great hope I place in you, most valued friend! I have written to Herr von Lüttichau, and herewith turn to Reissiger. If Devrient cannot give up her Armida, if she cannot afford me the sacrifice of a whim, then all my welfare rests only on the promptness with which this opera is brought out, and my own is taken up. I therefore fervently pray Reissiger to hurry: and you--I beseech you--do the same with Devrient. By punctuality and diligence everything can still be set right for me; for the chief thing is--only that my opera should come out before Easter (that is to say, in the first half of March). I am truly quite exhausted! Alas! I meet with so little that is encouraging, that it would really be of untold import to me if, at least in Dresden, things should go according to my wish!"

These excerpts afford some notion of the struggles and disappointments of this time--struggles that were to be repeated when, more than twenty years later, _Tristan_ and the _Mastersingers_ were produced in Munich. More need not be quoted, for the story is always the same--delays caused by intrigues and the whims and caprice of singers, and the indifference of inartistic directors.

It should be said that Meyerbeer seems, for the only time, really to have helped Wagner in getting _Rienzi_ accepted, for a letter of his to von Lüttichau recommending the opera, has been preserved; wherefore let us gladly acknowledge this deed, which was a good, if a very small, one. He again paid a visit to Paris, and this time gave Wagner a word of introduction to Pillet, who had assumed the post of director of the Opéra. Owing to this introduction the _Flying Dutchman_ was written. Wagner sketched a scenario and let Pillet have it. The customary procrastination set in, and at last Pillet flatly told Wagner he could not produce an opera by him: he was young, a German, and so on and so on; and in a word he liked the scenario and had determined to have it set by one Dietsch--which is not a very French-sounding name. He offered Wagner twenty pounds for it, and if the offer was not accepted--well, Wagner might do what he chose. Wagner took it.

He completed his libretto, took lodgings at Meudon, then a lovely suburb of Paris, hired a piano and sat down to compose his _Dutchman_. He gives a graphic account of his tremors whilst awaiting the piano: he feared that during the degrading struggle for bread the power of composing might have deserted him. The instrument arrived, he sat down, and shouting for joy, struck out the sailors' chorus. In seven weeks the draft was complete--it is dated September 13, 1841. Want of funds compelled him to leave Meudon and resume his treadmill toil--this time in the Rue Jacob in Paris; but he began to score his opera in the autumn and by the end of the year it was entirely finished. He sent it to the Berlin Opera, and at once began to cast round for another subject. He had demonstrated to his own complete satisfaction that grand historical themes were the only useful material for a thoroughly "up-to-date" (date 1842--seventy years ago) composer; and while doing what may be called foraging work he had hit upon the story of _The Saracen Young Woman_. We may presume that this appealed to him in a mood of reaction after the intensely personal quality of the _Dutchman_. That mood sent him back in the direction of _Rienzi_. About the _Dutchman_ he never had the slightest illusion. He knew it to be so far ahead of the time that nothing in the way of a popular success was to be hoped for it. On the other hand, he had perfect faith--a faith justified by the subsequent event--in _Rienzi_; and since the Wagner of 1842 was by no means the Wagner of 1862, or even of 1852, since also he had been half-starved for a couple of years and money seemed to him a highly desirable thing, he naturally, inevitably, was drawn towards a subject which promised as well, from the box-office point of view, as _Rienzi_.

However, there is--or was in Wagner's case--a divinity that shapes our ends. Much as he hungered after comforts, luxuries and the flesh-pots of Egypt, the dæmon within his breast was too strong for him. He had planned a new work, more or less on the lines of _Rienzi_, and perhaps some lucky or unlucky accident might have sent him the inspiration to start with the music. But just at this juncture Lehrs' copy of the _Sängerkrieg_ attracted his attention: the complete drama of _Tannhäuser_, and the first vague notion of _Lohengrin_, flashed upon him. As he said, and as I have repeated, a new world was opened before his amazed eyes. The _Saracen Young Woman_ and the rest all went to the wall; and when on April 7, 1842, he set out for Dresden he had different plans altogether in his head. Before he could start Schlesinger advanced the money for more cornet-à-piston arrangements of opera-airs, and he had to take the scores of those operas amongst his luggage.

As yet I have said nothing about his acquaintance with Liszt. It began at this time, and of course was destined to have wonderful results, but for the moment it was of no importance. Wagner was an unknown composer; Liszt was a world-famous pianist. Wagner, moreover, had written only _Rienzi_ and the _Dutchman_, and was unable even to play them on the piano. He probably made only the slightest impression on Liszt. The incident is worth noticing in this chapter, because, though this Paris episode seems to be nothing but a series of disasters, it is an instance of the good that came of it. Wagner undoubtedly learnt a lot about the stage; he got to know Liszt; he had the world of _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_ opened out to him. When he went off to Dresden and touched German soil once more he swore he would never again leave his fatherland. But he had learnt what his fatherland was quite unable to teach him. His friends said his character changed entirely during this period. Undoubtedly it did change: the Wagner who had aimed only at worldly, commercial success, changed into Wagner the artist whose sincerity carried him through all troubles to the crowning triumph--and discomfiture--of Bayreuth. I have referred before to the fact of the old momentum keeping him going in a certain direction even after he knew that direction to be a wrong one; and the same thing was to occur again, as we shall see in a moment. After writing the _Dutchman_ he actually deliberated as to the wisdom of doing another _Rienzi_. The claims of his stomach were, naturally after a two years of semi-starvation, very strong, and another _Rienzi_ might have meant easily earned bread-and-butter. But the Paris change was fundamental; and even if he had tried to do another _Rienzi_ he could not possibly have done it. Without his knowing it, the artist in him had triumphed over the merely commercial composer.