![]() ![]() But Wagner was operating on another level as well. So, many people have written many books and articles analyzing Wagner in that way. What might its nationalist or volkisch message be? ![]() Watch the scene here, from the Met’s recent production. He tricks them into divulging the secret of how to obtain it: renounce love. Three maidens swim there guarding its gold, when a greedy dwarf arrives to steal it. Consider this opening scene of the Ring Cycle’s first night, where the curtain rises upon the Rhine. How are they Germanic? How are they nationalist? Just as we did with Verdi’s Nabuco, we can read the content as metaphor for nationalism. So one way to approach this is to consider its content: themes, characters, settings. It ends with a ceremony of holy communion, everyone brought together in a common religious experience. An innocent youth steps forward to take up knighthood, recover the grail, and heal the land. Parsifal: In his final opera, Wagner presented a German version of the Holy Grail legend of the Fisher King, a sick king whose illness then causes the land to be sick.The concept of the Volk became of foremost importance to the conservative-nationalist movement in Germany. The Meistersinger of Nuremberg: A singing contest in Germany’s most prototypical medieval city shows the organic Volk (people’s) community.Tristan and Isolde: A German Romeo & Juliet.They just did so last fall, for the Met’s awe-inspiring production.) (Also use the PBS site on the Ring for its Great Performances series as a resource - every 20 years or so, PBS airs the current definitive version of the Ring Cycle. The Ring of the Niebelung (aka the Ring Cycle): An epic four-night long drama of ancient Germanic myth, in which the gods build the world, introduce evil, try to preserve their authority against humanity’s challenge, and are eventually overthrown and destroyed.Perhaps most important in this respect are his middle and late period works: We see this pattern in Wagner as well.Īlmost all of his works draw from Germanic myth, which he wanted to transmit to a new generation in exciting ways. Then they used this unified canon (an established past) as a point to rally their people (an activist present) to forge a united nation (a proposed future). Remember from our other thread, the common experience of cultural nationalism: in the early phase, cultural nationalists worked to recover or re-invent traditional cultural stories in order to argue for the importance of their people’s cultural experience. Here is a link to Wagner and Me on youtube: it can serve as a primer to Wagner, as well as a visual illustration of many of his works.įor now, however, let’s remain in the 19th century. Stephen Fry, the cultural treasure and very respected public intellectual in his native Britain, made a masterful hour-long documentary on this subject. Later generations therefore have to grapple with the question of whether or not it is okay to like and appreciate his work. This experience led to a longstanding ban on Wagner in the state of Israel. As legend goes, his works were played over the loudspeakers at concentration camps, or were played live by Jewish musicians held captive and forced to perform. The Nazis happily appropriated Wagner as their patron composer, both because of his seeming ideological affinity and because of Hitler’s personal liking for the works. Having achieved his dream of a unified Germany, that country’s path went to some obviously very dark places in the 20th century. But he is also a very problematic figure as well, because of the use to which his operas were put. He is such a monumental figure that it’s easy to find information on him – check this official site for a variety of biographical material, interviews, and information about his works. To finish my experiment with spacing the posts, I bring you at last…. ![]()
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