『我が生涯 第1巻』

Amid the social noise, Wagner was hard at work on the Lohengrin libretto, which he read to friends that November to near-universal praise, save for Franck’s critique of its tragic ending: Franck balked at Elsa’s punishment via Lohengrin’s departure, arguing it lacked dramatic realism. Wagner wavered briefly until Frau von Lüttichau, the general director’s wife, wrote to insist his original vision was the only poetically valid one, shoring up his confidence. A later similar critique from Adolf Stahr sent him into a brief panic, but he quickly reaffirmed his choice, sending Franz Liszt a terse note: “Stahr is wrong, and Lohengrin is right.”

That spring, Wagner poured energy into preparing the Dresden premiere of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for the annual Palm Sunday Pension Fund benefit, a choice that horrified the orchestra’s trustees, who feared the then-unpopular, poorly received work would tank donations. Wagner won over General Director Lüttichau, wrote a popular accessible programme guide to the symphony, and placed anonymous enthusiastic ads in the Dresden Anzeiger to build public interest. He made painstaking interpretive choices to fix long-standing performance flaws, and the packed, rapturous performance set a new earnings record for the Pension Fund, leaving Wagner convinced of his power to shape public artistic taste, even as he despaired at the ongoing struggles to get his own work recognized beyond Dresden.

His peace was short-lived, crushed by a sudden financial crisis. A failed omen—he and his nominal publisher C.F. Meser served tarragon vinegar instead of Sauterne at a meeting to plan Easter Fair earnings—convinced him the fair would not rescue him from debt. The final blow came from Madame Schröder-Devrient, the celebrated soprano who had lent him 3,000 marks when he first arrived in Dresden. Jealous of his niece Johanna and convinced Wagner had pushed for her dismissal, she handed his IOU to a lawyer and sued for repayment, forcing Wagner to confess his full debt load to Lüttichau and beg for a royal loan from the Theatre Pension Fund. The loan came with brutal terms: 5% interest, plus a 3% annual fee for a life insurance policy to secure the fund’s capital. With the help of his friend Dr. Pusinelli, who vouched for his health, he secured the policy, and made a final trip to Leipzig to meet veteran composer Louis Spohr, who sought reconciliation after his opera Die Kreuzfahrer was rejected by the Dresden theatre. The meeting was warm: Spohr, a tall, dignified man, confessed his artistic conservatism stemmed from his childhood awe of Mozart’s Magic Flute, and expressed enthusiasm for Lohengrin to Wagner’s brother-in-law at a post-meeting dinner. Wagner then obtained a three-month leave to recuperate in a peasant’s cottage in Gross-Graupen, on the edge of Saxon Switzerland.