Wagner
himself knew it well. His letters show the despair of a soul wrestling
with its familiar spirit, which it clutches and holds, only to lose
again. And we seem to hear cries of pain, and feel his anger and
despair.
"I can never tell you what a really wretched musician I am. In my
inmost heart I know I am a bungler and an absolute failure. You
should see me when I say to myself, 'It ought to go now,' and sit
down to the piano and put together some miserable rubbish, which I
fling away again like an idiot. I know quite well the kind of
musical trash I produce.... Believe me, it is no good expecting me
to do anything decent. Sometimes I really think it was Reissiger
who inspired me to write _Tannhaeuser_ and _Lohengrin_."
This is how Wagner wrote to Liszt when he was finishing this amazing
work of art. In the same way Michelangelo wrote to his father in 1509:
"I am in agony. I have not dared to ask the Pope for anything, because
my work does not make sufficient progress to merit any remuneration. The
work is too difficult, and indeed it is not my profession. I am wasting
my time to no purpose.
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