* * * * *
In my opinion, _Siegfried_, in spirit and in form, stands alone in
Wagner's work. It breathes perfect health and happiness, and it
overflows with gladness. Only _Die Meistersinger_ rivals it in
merriment, though even there one does not find such a nice balance of
poetry and music.
And _Siegfried_ rouses one's admiration the more when one thinks that it
was the offspring of sickness and suffering. The time at which Wagner
wrote it was one of the saddest in his life. It often happens so in art.
One goes astray in trying to interpret an artist's life by his work, for
it is exceptional to find one a counterpart of the other. It is more
likely that an artist's work will express the opposite of his life--the
things that he did not experience. The object of art is to fill up what
is missing in the artist's experience: "Art begins where life leaves
off," said Wagner. A man of action is rarely pleased with stimulating
works of art. Borgia and Sforza patronised Leonardo. The strong,
full-blooded men of the seventeenth century; the apoplectic court at
Versailles (where Fagon's lancet played so necessary a part); the
generals and ministers who harassed the Protestants and burned the
Palatinate--all these loved pastorales.
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