He had spoken to me of Godfrey von Strassburg, saying, “To-morrow I will read you something good.” He did next day read me “Tristan” in his study, and we spoke long and earnestly as to its adaptability for operatic treatment. Events have shown it to have been the ground-work of the music-drama of the same name. But at the time he spoke, it appeared to me he had no thought of utilizing it as a libretto. This intention only presented itself to his mind while we three were at breakfast on the following day. He was reading the notices in the Leipzic paper with customary variation, when, without any indication, he dropped the paper onto his knees, gazed into space, and seemed as though he were in a trance, nervously moving his lips. What did this portend? Minna had observed the movement, and was about to break the silence by addressing Wagner. Happily, she caught my warning glance and the spell remained unbroken. We waited until Wagner should move. When he did, I said, “I know what you have been doing.” “No,” he answered, somewhat abruptly, “how can you?” “Yes; you have been composing the love-song we were speaking of yesterday, and the story is going to shape itself into a drama!” “You are right as to the composition, but--the libretto--I will reflect.” Such is the history of the first promptings of that wondrous creation, “Tristan and Isolde.”
But how, how did this Titanic genius compose? Did he, like dear old papa Haydn, perform an elaborate toilet, donning his best coat, and pray to be inspired before setting himself to his writing-table away from the piano? or were his surroundings and method akin to those of Beethoven?--a room given over to muddle and confusion, the Bonn master writing, erasing, re-writing, and again scratching out, while _at_ the piano! Well, distinctly, Wagner had nothing in common with Haydn. The style of Beethoven is far removed from him as regards the state of his working-room. I am desirous there should be no misunderstanding on Wagner’s method of composing, because I find that my testimony is in conflict with some published statements on this subject, from those whose names carry some weight.
Wagner composed at the piano, in an elegantly well arranged study. With him composing was a work of excitement and much labour. He did not shake the notes from his pen as pepper from a caster. How could it be otherwise than labour with a man holding such views as his? Listen to what he says: “For a work to live, to go down to future generations, it must be reflective,” and again in “Opera and Drama,” written about this time, “A composer, in planning and working out a great idea, must pass through a kind of parturition.” Mark the word “parturition.” Such it was with him. He laboured excessively. Not to find or make up a phrase; no, he did not seek his ideas at the piano. He went to the piano with his idea already composed, and made the piano his sketch-book, wherein he worked and reworked his subject, steadily modelling his matter until it assumed the shape he had in his mind. The subject of representative themes was discussed much by us, and he explained to me that he felt chained to the piano until he had found precisely that which shaped itself before his mental vision. I had one morning retired to my room for the Schopenhauer study, when the piano was pounded--yes, pounded is the exact word--more vigorously than usual. The incessant repetition of one theme arrested my attention. Schopenhauer was discarded. I came down stairs. The theme was being played with another rhythm. I entered the room. “Ah!” he exclaimed, “you have been listening!” “Who could help it?” was my answer. “Your vigorous playing fascinated me more than skilful philosophical dialectics!” And then I inquired as to the reason of the change of rhythm. The explanation astonished me. Wagner was engaged on a portion of “Siegfried,” the scene where Mime tells Siegfried of his murderous intentions whilst under the magic influence of the tarn helm. “But how did you come to change the rhythm?” “Oh,” he said, “I tried and tried, thought and thought, until I got just what I wanted.” And that it was perseverance with him, and not spontaneity, is borne out by another incident. The Wesendoncks were at the chalet. Wagner was at the piano, anxious to shine, doubtless, in the presence of a lady who caused such unpleasantness in his career later on. He was improvising, when, in the midst of a flowing movement, he suddenly stopped, unable to finish. I laughed. Wagner became angry, but I jocularly said, “Ah, you got into a _cul-de-sac_ and finished _en queue de poisson_.” He could not be angry long, and joined in the laugh too, confessing to me that he was only at his best when reflecting.