Is that
voice of instinct cursed or blessed? I do not know; but I yield to
it, and never force myself to run counter to my inclination."
Wagner fought against civilisation by quite other methods than those
employed by Tolstoy; and if the efforts of the two were equally great,
the practical result is--one must really say it--as poor on one side as
on the other.
What Tolstoy's raillery is really aimed at is not Wagner's work, but the
way in which his work was represented. The splendours of the setting do
not hide the childishness of the ideas behind them: the dragon Fafna,
Fricka's rams, the bear, the serpent, and all the Valhalla menagerie
have always been ridiculous. I will only add that the dragon's failure
to be terrifying was not Wagner's fault, for he never attempted to
depict a terrifying dragon. He gave it quite clearly, and of his own
choice, a comic character. Both the text and the music make Fafner a
sort of ogre, a simple creature, but, above all, a grotesque one.
Besides, I cannot help feeling that scenic reality takes away rather
than adds to the effect of these great philosophical fairylands. Malwida
von Meysenbug told me that at the Bayreuth festival of 1876, while she
was following one of the _Ring_ scenes very attentively with her
opera-glasses, two hands were laid over her eyes, and she heard Wagner's
voice say impatiently: "Don't look so much at what is going on.
Pages:
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128