Rehearsal; Richter is here, dines with his wife at our table. The rehearsal, at which R. demonstrates everything himself, has greatly fatigued him, yet his satisfaction in Unger remains. After dinner R. considers whether, in Rheingold, when Wotan greets Walhall (“so name I the stronghold”), he should have him take up a sword which Fafner, because it is not of gold, has contemptuously thrust aside from the hoard. It would be the sword which Wotan later drives into the ash-tree; Alberich had caused it to be forged for the struggle against giants and gods. Richter relates that Herr Jauner could not comprehend why R. is so reluctant to consent to the performance of Die Walküre; other composers, he says, are glad when their works are performed! … In the evening R. returns greatly wearied from the swimming rehearsal. (The Sultan Abdul Aziz has been deposed and strangled—a strange outcome of the conference between Andrássy, Gortschakow, and Bismarck![1])
[1] Julius (or Gyula) Count Andrássy the Elder (1823-1890), Austro-Hungarian statesman, thwarted Beust’s anti-Prussian policies and succeeded him as Foreign Minister in 1871; Prince Alexander Mikhailovich Gorchakov (1798-1883), Russian statesman and diplomat, Chancellor from 1862, supported Bismarck’s policies until 1878, when the Congress of Berlin demarcated the spheres of influence; cf. Russo-Turkish War, note on April 25 and on Disraeli, December 28, 1877; Andrássy had brought about the Three Emperors’ League with Bismarck and Gorchakov in 1872 and now, in 1876, paved the way for good relations with Russia at the imperial meeting in Reichstadt in 1876; he took his leave in 1879.
Revised English translation by Jo Cousins [© Jo Cousins | WAGNER Salon]