I was born at Leipzig on the 22nd
of May 1813, in a room on the second floor of the ‘Red and White
Lion,’ and two days later was baptized at St. Thomas’s Church, and
christened Wilhelm Richard.
My father, Friedrich Wagner, was
at the time of my birth a clerk in the police service at Leipzig,
and hoped to get the post of Chief Constable in that town, but he
died in the October of that same year. His death was partly due to
the great exertions imposed upon him by the stress of police work
during the war troubles and the battle of Leipzig, and partly to
the fact that he fell a victim to the nervous fever which was
raging at that time. As regards his father’s position in life, I
learnt later that he had held a small civil appointment as toll
collector at the Ranstädt Gate, but had distinguished himself from
those in the same station by giving his two sons a superior
education, my father, Friedrich, studying law, and the younger son,
Adolph, theology.
My uncle subsequently exercised
no small influence on my development; we shall meet him again at a
critical turning-point in the story of my youth.
My father, whom I had lost so
early, was, as I discovered afterwards, a great lover of poetry and
literature in general, and possessed in particular an almost
passionate affection for the drama, which was at that time much in
vogue among the educated classes. My mother told me, among other
things, that he took her to Lauchstadt for the first performance of
the Braut von Messina, and that on the promenade he pointed out
Schiller and Goethe to her, and reproved her warmly for never
having heard of these great men. He is said to have been not
altogether free from a gallant interest in actresses. My mother
used to complain jokingly that she often had to keep lunch waiting
for him while he was paying court to a certain famous actress of
the day (Madame Hartwig). When she scolded him, he vowed that he
had been delayed by papers that had to be attended to, and as a
proof of his assertion pointed to his fingers, which were supposed
to be stained with ink, but on closer inspection were found to be
quite clean. His great fondness for the theatre was further shown
by his choice of the actor, Ludwig Geyer, as one of his intimate
friends. Although his choice of this friend was no doubt mainly due
to his love for the theatre, he at the same time introduced into
his family the noblest of benefactors; for this modest artist,
prompted by a warm interest in the lot of his friend’s large
family, so unexpectedly left destitute, devoted the remainder of
his life to making strenuous efforts to maintain and educate the
orphans. Even when the police official was spending his evenings at
the theatre, the worthy actor generally filled his place in the
family circle, and it seems had frequently to appease my mother,
who, rightly or wrongly, complained of the frivolity of her
husband.
How deeply the homeless artist,
hard pressed by life and tossed to and fro, longed to feel himself
at home in a sympathetic family circle, was proved by the fact that
a year after his friend’s death he married his widow, and from that
time forward became a most loving father to the seven children that
had been left behind.
In this onerous undertaking he
was favoured by an unexpected improvement in his position, for he
obtained a remunerative, respectable, and permanent engagement, as
a character actor, at the newly established Court Theatre in
Dresden. His talent for painting, which had already helped him to
earn a livelihood when forced by extreme poverty to break off his
university studies, again stood him in good stead in his position
at Dresden. True, he complained even more than his critics that he
had been kept from a regular and systematic study of this art, yet
his extraordinary aptitude, for portrait painting in particular,
secured him such important commissions that he unfortunately
exhausted his strength prematurely by his twofold exertions as
painter and actor. Once, when he was invited to Munich to fulfil a
temporary engagement at the Court Theatre, he received, through the
distinguished recommendation of the Saxon Court, such pressing
commissions from the Bavarian Court for portraits of the royal
family that he thought it wise to cancel his contract altogether.
He also had a turn for poetry. Besides fragments—often in very
dainty verse—he wrote several comedies, one of which, Der
Bethlehemitische Kindermord, in rhymed Alexandrines, was often
performed; it was published and received the warmest praise from
Goethe.
This excellent man, under whose
care our family moved to Dresden when I was two years old, and by
whom my mother had another daughter, Cecilia, now also took my
education in hand with the greatest care and affection. He wished
to adopt me altogether, and accordingly, when I was sent to my
first school, he gave me his own name, so that till the age of
fourteen I was known to my Dresden schoolfellows as Richard Geyer;
and it was not until some years after my stepfather’s death, and on
my family’s return to Leipzig, the home of my own kith and kin,
that I resumed the name of Wagner.
The earliest recollections of my
childhood are associated with my stepfather, and passed from him to
the theatre. I well remember that he would have liked to see me
develop a talent for painting; and his studio, with the easel and
the pictures upon it, did not fail to impress me. I remember in
particular that I tried, with a childish love of imitation, to copy
a portrait of King Frederick Augustus of Saxony; but when this
simple daubing had to give place to a serious study of drawing, I
could not stand it, possibly because I was discouraged by the
pedantic technique of my teacher, a cousin of mine, who was rather
a bore. At one time during my early boyhood I became so weak after
some childish ailment that my mother told me later she used almost
to wish me dead, for it seemed as though I should never get well.
However, my subsequent good health apparently astonished my
parents. I afterwards learnt the noble part played by my excellent
stepfather on this occasion also; he never gave way to despair, in
spite of the cares and troubles of so large a family, but remained
patient throughout, and never lost the hope of pulling me through
safely.
My imagination at this time was
deeply impressed by my acquaintance with the theatre, with which I
was brought into contact, not only as a childish spectator from the
mysterious stagebox, with its access to the stage, and by visits to
the wardrobe with its fantastic costumes, wigs and other disguises,
but also by taking a part in the performances myself. After I had
been filled with fear by seeing my father play the villain’s part
in such tragedies as Die Waise und der Mörder, Die beiden
Galeerensklaven, I occasionally took part in comedy. I remember
that I appeared in Der Weinberg an der Elbe, a piece specially
written to welcome the King of Saxony on his return from captivity,
with music by the conductor, C. M. von Weber. In this I figured in
a tableau vivant as an angel, sewn up in tights with wings on my
back, in a graceful pose which I had laboriously practised. I also
remember on this occasion being given a big iced cake, which I was
assured the King had intended for me personally. Lastly, I can
recall taking a child’s part in which I had a few words to speak in
Kotzebue’s Menschenhass und Reue, which furnished me with an excuse
at school for not having learnt my lessons. I said I had too much
to do, as I had to learn by heart an important part in Den Menschen
ausser der Reihe.
On the other hand, to show how
seriously my father regarded my education, when I was six years old
he took me to a clergyman in the country at Possendorf, near
Dresden, where I was to be given a sound and healthy training with
other boys of my own class. In the evening, the vicar, whose name
was Wetzel, used to tell us the story of Robinson Crusoe, and
discuss it with us in a highly instructive manner. I was, moreover,
much impressed by a biography of Mozart which was read aloud; and
the newspaper accounts and monthly reports of the events of the
Greek War of Independence stirred my imagination deeply. My love
for Greece, which afterwards made me turn with enthusiasm to the
mythology and history of ancient Hellas, was thus the natural
outcome of the intense and painful interest I took in the events of
this period. In after years the story of the struggle of the Greeks
against the Persians always revived my impressions of this modern
revolt of Greece against the Turks.
One day, when I had been in this
country home scarcely a year, a messenger came from town to ask the
vicar to take me to my parents’ house in Dresden, as my father was
dying.
We did the three hours’ journey
on foot; and as I was very exhausted when I arrived, I scarcely
understood why my mother was crying. The next day I was taken to my
father’s bedside; the extreme weakness with which he spoke to me,
combined with all the precautions taken in the last desperate
treatment of his complaint—acute hydrothorax—made the whole scene
appear like a dream to me, and I think I was too frightened and
surprised to cry.
In the next room my mother asked
me to show her what I could play on the piano, wisely hoping to
divert my father’s thoughts by the sound. I played Ueb’ immer Treu
und Redlichkeit, and my father said to her, ‘Is it possible he has
musical talent?’
In the early hours of the next
morning my mother came into the great night nursery, and, standing
by the bedside of each of us in turn, told us, with sobs, that our
father was dead, and gave us each a message with his blessing. To
me she said, ‘He hoped to make something of you.’
In the afternoon my schoolmaster,
Wetzel, came to take me back to the country. We walked the whole
way to Possendorf, arriving at nightfall. On the way I asked him
many questions about the stars, of which he gave me my first
intelligent idea.
A week later my stepfather’s
brother arrived from Eisleben for the funeral. He promised, as far
as he was able, to support the family, which was now once more
destitute, and undertook to provide for my future education.
I took leave of my companions and
of the kind-hearted clergyman, and it was for his funeral that I
paid my next visit to Possendorf a few years later. I did not go to
the place again till long afterwards, when I visited it on an
excursion such as I often made, far into the country, at the time
when I was conducting the orchestra in Dresden. I was much grieved
not to find the old parsonage still there, but in its place a more
pretentious modern structure, which so turned me against the
locality, that thenceforward my excursions were always made in
another direction.
This time my uncle brought me
back to Dresden in the carriage. I found my mother and sister in
the deepest mourning, and remember being received for the first
time with a tenderness not usual in our family; and I noticed that
the same tenderness marked our leave-taking, when, a few days
later, my uncle took me with him to Eisleben.
This uncle, who was a younger
brother of my stepfather, had settled there as a goldsmith, and
Julius, one of my elder brothers, had already been apprenticed to
him. Our old grandmother also lived with this bachelor son, and as
it was evident that she could not live long, she was not informed
of the death of her eldest son, which I, too, was bidden to keep to
myself. The servant carefully removed the crape from my coat,
telling me she would keep it until my grandmother died, which was
likely to be soon.
I was now often called upon to
tell her about my father, and it was no great difficulty for me to
keep the secret of his death, as I had scarcely realised it myself.
She lived in a dark back room looking out upon a narrow courtyard,
and took a great delight in watching the robins that fluttered
freely about her, and for which she always kept fresh green boughs
by the stove. When some of these robins were killed by the cat, I
managed to catch others for her in the neighbourhood, which pleased
her very much, and, in return, she kept me tidy and clean. Her
death, as had been expected, took place before long, and the crape
that had been put away was now openly worn in Eisleben.
The back room, with its robins
and green branches, now knew me no more, but I soon made myself at
home with a soap-boiler’s family, to whom the house belonged, and
became popular with them on account of the stories I told
them.
I was sent to a private school
kept by a man called Weiss, who left an impression of gravity and
dignity upon my mind.
Towards the end of the fifties I
was greatly moved at reading in a musical paper the account of a
concert at Eisleben, consisting of parts of Tannhäuser, at which my
former master, who had not forgotten his young pupil, had been
present.
The little old town with Luther’s
house, and the numberless memorials it contained of his stay there,
has often, in later days, come back to me in dreams. I have always
wished to revisit it and verify the clearness of my recollections,
but, strange to say, it has never been my fate to do so. We lived
in the market-place, where I was often entertained by strange
sights, such, for instance, as performances by a troupe of
acrobats, in which a man walked a rope stretched from tower to
tower across the square, an achievement which long inspired me with
a passion for such feats of daring. Indeed, I got so far as to walk
a rope fairly easily myself with the help of a balancing-pole. I
had made the rope out of cords twisted together and stretched
across the courtyard, and even now I still feel a desire to gratify
my acrobatic instincts. The thing that attracted me most, however,
was the brass band of a Hussar regiment quartered at Eisleben. It
often played a certain piece which had just come out, and which was
making a great sensation, I mean the ‘Huntsmen’s Chorus’ out of the
Freischutz, that had been recently performed at the Opera in
Berlin. My uncle and brother asked me eagerly about its composer,
Weber, whom I must have seen at my parents’ house in Dresden, when
he was conductor of the orchestra there.
About the same time the
Jungfernkranz was zealously played and sung by some friends who
lived near us. These two pieces cured me of my weakness for the
‘Ypsilanti’ Waltz, which till that time I had regarded as the most
wonderful of compositions.
I have recollections of frequent
tussles with the town boys, who were constantly mocking at me for
my ‘square’ cap; and I remember, too, that I was very fond of
rambles of adventure among the rocky banks of the Unstrut.
My uncle’s marriage late in life,
and the starting of his new home, brought about a marked alteration
in his relations to my family.
After a lapse of a year I was
taken by him to Leipzig, and handed over for some days to the
Wagners, my own father’s relatives, consisting of my uncle Adolph
and his sister Friederike Wagner. This extraordinarily interesting
man, whose influence afterwards became ever more stimulating to me,
now for the first time brought himself and his singular environment
into my life.
He and my aunt were very close
friends of Jeannette Thome, a queer old maid who shared with them a
large house in the market-place, in which, if I am not mistaken,
the Electoral family of Saxony had, ever since the days of Augustus
the Strong, hired and furnished the two principal storeys for their
own use whenever they were in Leipzig.
So far as I know, Jeannette Thome
really owned the second storey, of which she inhabited only a
modest apartment looking out on the courtyard. As, however, the
King merely occupied the hired rooms for a few days in the year,
Jeannette and her circle generally made use of his splendid
apartments, and one of these staterooms was made into a bedroom for
me.
The decorations and fittings of
these rooms also dated from the days of Augustus the Strong. They
were luxurious with heavy silk and rich rococo furniture, all of
which were much soiled with age. As a matter of fact, I was
delighted by these large strange rooms, looking out upon the
bustling Leipzig market-place, where I loved above all to watch the
students in the crowd making their way along in their old-fashioned
‘Club’ attire, and filling up the whole width of the street.
There was only one portion of the
decorations of the rooms that I thoroughly disliked, and this
consisted of the various portraits, but particularly those of
high-born dames in hooped petticoats, with youthful faces and
powdered hair. These appeared to me exactly like ghosts, who, when
I was alone in the room, seemed to come back to life, and filled me
with the most abject fear. To sleep alone in this distant chamber,
in that old-fashioned bed of state, beneath those unearthly
pictures, was a constant terror to me. It is true I tried to hide
my fear from my aunt when she lighted me to bed in the evening with
her candle, but never a night passed in which I was not a prey to
the most horrible ghostly visions, my dread of which would leave me
in a bath of perspiration.
The personality of the three
chief occupants of this storey was admirably adapted to materialise
the ghostly impressions of the house into a reality that resembled
some strange fairy-tale.
Jeannette Thome was very small
and stout; she wore a fair Titus wig, and seemed to hug to herself
the consciousness of vanished beauty. My aunt, her faithful friend
and guardian, who was also an old maid, was remarkable for the
height and extreme leanness of her person. The oddity of her
otherwise very pleasant face was increased by an exceedingly
pointed chin.
My uncle Adolph had chosen as his
permanent study a dark room in the courtyard. There it was that I
saw him for the first time, surrounded by a great wilderness of
books, and attired in an unpretentious indoor costume, the most
striking feature of which was a tall, pointed felt cap, such as I
had seen worn by the clown who belonged to the troupe of
rope-dancers at Eisleben. A great love of independence had driven
him to this strange retreat. He had been originally destined for
the Church, but he soon gave that up, in order to devote himself
entirely to philological studies. But as he had the greatest
dislike of acting as a professor and teacher in a regular post, he
soon tried to make a meagre livelihood by literary work. He had
certain social gifts, and especially a fine tenor voice, and
appears in his youth to have been welcome as a man of letters among
a fairly wide circle of friends at Leipzig.
On a trip to Jena, during which
he and a companion seem to have found their way into various
musical and oratorical associations, he paid a visit to Schiller.
With this object in view, he had come armed with a request from the
management of the Leipzig Theatre, who wanted to secure the rights
of Wallenstein, which was just finished. He told me later of the
magic impression made upon him by Schiller, with his tall slight
figure and irresistibly attractive blue eyes. His only complaint
was that, owing to a well-meant trick played on him by his friend,
he had been placed in a most trying position; for the latter had
managed to send Schiller a small volume of Adolph Wagner’s poems in
advance.
The young poet was much
embarrassed to hear Schiller address him in flattering terms on the
subject of his poetry, but was convinced that the great man was
merely encouraging him out of kindness. Afterwards he devoted
himself entirely to philological studios—one of his best-known
publications in that department being his Parnasso Italiano, which
he dedicated to Goethe in an Italian poem. True, I have heard
experts say that the latter was written in unusually pompous
Italian; but Goethe sent him a letter full of praise, as well as a
silver cup from his own household plate. The impression that I, as
a boy of eight, conceived of Adolph Wagner, amid the surroundings
of his own home, was that he was a peculiarly puzzling
character.
I soon had to leave the influence
of this environment and was brought back to my people at Dresden.
Meanwhile my family, under the guidance of my bereaved mother, had
been obliged to settle down as well as they could under the
circumstances. My eldest brother Albert, who originally intended to
study medicine, had, upon the advice of Weber, who had much admired
his beautiful tenor voice, started his theatrical career in
Breslau. My second sister Louisa soon followed his example, and
became an actress. My eldest sister Rosalie had obtained an
excellent engagement at the Dresden Court Theatre, and the younger
members of the family all looked up to her; for she was now the
main support of our poor sorrowing mother. My family still occupied
the same comfortable home which my father had made for them. Some
of the spare rooms were occasionally let to strangers, and Spohr
was among those who at one time lodged with us. Thanks to her great
energy, and to help received from various sources (among which the
continued generosity of the Court, out of respect to the memory of
my late stepfather, must not be forgotten), my mother managed so
well in making both ends meet, that even my education did not
suffer.
After it had been decided that my
sister Clara, owing to her exceedingly beautiful voice, should also
go on the stage, my mother took the greatest care to prevent me
from developing any taste whatever for the theatre. She never
ceased to reproach herself for having consented to the theatrical
career of my eldest brother, and as my second brother showed no
greater talents than those which were useful to him as a goldsmith,
it was now her chief desire to see some progress made towards the
fulfilment of the hopes and wishes of my step-father, ‘who hoped to
make something of me.’ On the completion of my eighth year I was
sent to the Kreuz Grammar School in Dresden, where it was hoped I
would study! There I was placed at the bottom of the lowest class,
and started my education under the most unassuming auspices.
My mother noted with much
interest the slightest signs I might show of a growing love and
ability for my work. She herself, though not highly educated,
always created a lasting impression on all who really learnt to
know her, and displayed a peculiar combination of practical
domestic efficiency and keen intellectual animation. She never gave
one of her children any definite information concerning her
antecedents. She came from Weissenfels, and admitted that her
parents had been bakers there. Even in regard to her maiden name
she always spoke with some embarrassment, and intimated that it was
‘Perthes,’ though, as we afterwards ascertained, it was in reality
‘Bertz.’ Strange to say, she had been placed in a high-class
boarding-school in Leipzig, where she had enjoyed the advantage of
the care and interest of one of ‘her father’s influential friends,’
to whom she afterwards referred as being a Weimar prince who had
been very kind to her family in Weissenfels. Her education in that
establishment seems to have been interrupted on account of the
sudden death of this ‘friend.’ She became acquainted with my father
at a very early age, and married him in the first bloom of her
youth, he also being very young, though he already held an
appointment. Her chief characteristics seem to have been a keen
sense of humour and an amiable temper, so we need not suppose that
it was merely a sense of duty towards the family of a departed
comrade that afterwards induced the admirable Ludwig Geyer to enter
into matrimony with her when she was no longer youthful, but rather
that he was impelled to that step by a sincere and warm regard for
the widow of his friend. A portrait of her, painted by Geyer during
the lifetime of my father, gives one a very favourable impression
of what she must have been. Even from the time when my recollection
of her is quite distinct, she always had to wear a cap owing to
some slight affection of the head, so that I have no recollection
of her as a young and pretty mother. Her trying position at the
head of a numerous family (of which I was the seventh surviving
member), the difficulty of obtaining the wherewithal to rear them,
and of keeping up appearances on very limited resources, did not
conduce to evolve that tender sweetness and solicitude which are
usually associated with motherhood. I hardly ever recollect her
having fondled me. Indeed, demonstrations of affection were not
common in our family, although a certain impetuous, almost
passionate and boisterous manner always characterised our dealings.
This being so, it naturally seemed to me quite a great event when
one night I, fretful with sleepiness, looked up at her with tearful
eyes as she was taking me to bed, and saw her gaze back at me
proudly and fondly, and speak of me to a visitor then present with
a certain amount of tenderness.
What struck me more particularly
about her was the strange enthusiasm and almost pathetic manner
with which she spoke of the great and of the beautiful in Art.
Under this heading, however, she would never have let me suppose
that she included dramatic art, but only Poetry, Music, and
Painting. Consequently, she often even threatened me with her curse
should I ever express a desire to go on the stage. Moreover, she
was very religiously inclined. With intense fervour she would often
give us long sermons about God and the divine quality in man,
during which, now and again, suddenly lowering her voice in a
rather funny way, she would interrupt herself in order to rebuke
one of us. After the death of our stepfather she used to assemble
us all round her bed every morning, when one of us would read out a
hymn or a part of the Church service from the prayer-book before
she took her coffee. Sometimes the choice of the part to be read
was hardly appropriate, as, for instance, when my sister Clara on
one occasion thoughtlessly read the ‘Prayer to be said in time of
War,’ and delivered it with so much expression that my mother
interrupted her, saying: ‘Oh, stop! Good gracious me! Things are
not quite so bad as that. There’s no war on at present!’
In spite of our limited means we
had lively and—as they appeared to my boyish imagination—even
brilliant evening parties sometimes. After the death of my
stepfather, who, thanks to his success as a portrait painter, in
the later years of his life had raised his income to what for those
days was a really decent total, many agreeable acquaintances of
very good social position whom he had made during this flourishing
period still remained on friendly terms with us, and would
occasionally join us at our evening gatherings. Amongst those who
came were the members of the Court Theatre, who at that time gave
very charming and highly entertaining parties of their own, which,
on my return to Dresden later on, I found had been altogether given
up.
Very delightful, too, were the
picnics arranged between us and our friends at some of the
beautiful spots around Dresden, for these excursions were always
brightened by a certain artistic spirit and general good cheer. I
remember one such outing we arranged to Loschwitz, where we made a
kind of gypsy camp, in which Carl Maria von Weber played his part
in the character of cook. At home we also had some music. My sister
Rosalie played the piano, and Clara was beginning to sing. Of the
various theatrical performances we organised in those early days,
often after elaborate preparation, with the view of amusing
ourselves on the birthdays of our elders, I can hardly remember
one, save a parody on the romantic play of Sappho, by Grillparzer,
in which I took part as one of the singers in the crowd that
preceded Phaon’s triumphal car. I endeavoured to revive these
memories by means of a fine puppet show, which I found among the
effects of my late stepfather, and for which he himself had painted
some beautiful scenery. It was my intention to surprise my people
by means of a brilliant performance on this little stage. After I
had very clumsily made several puppets, and had provided them with
a scanty wardrobe made from cuttings of material purloined from my
sisters, I started to compose a chivalric drama, in which I
proposed to rehearse my puppets. When I had drafted the first
scene, my sisters happened to discover the MS. and literally
laughed it to scorn, and, to my great annoyance, for a long time
afterwards they chaffed me by repeating one particular sentence
which I had put into the mouth of the heroine, and which was—Ich
hore schon den Ritter trapsen (‘I hear his knightly footsteps
falling’). I now returned with renewed ardour to the theatre, with
which, even at this time, my family was in close touch. Den
Freischutz in particular appealed very strongly to my imagination,
mainly on account of its ghostly theme. The emotions of terror and
the dread of ghosts formed quite an important factor in the
development of my mind. From my earliest childhood certain
mysterious and uncanny things exercised an enormous influence over
me. If I were left alone in a room for long, I remember that, when
gazing at lifeless objects such as pieces of furniture, and
concentrating my attention upon them, I would suddenly shriek out
with fright, because they seemed to me alive. Even during the
latest years of my boyhood, not a night passed without my waking
out of some ghostly dream and uttering the most frightful shrieks,
which subsided only at the sound of some human voice. The most
severe rebuke or even chastisement seemed to me at those times no
more than a blessed release. None of my brothers or sisters would
sleep anywhere near me. They put me to sleep as far as possible
away from the others, without thinking that my cries for help would
only be louder and longer; but in the end they got used even to
this nightly disturbance.
In connection with this childish
terror, what attracted me so strongly to the theatre—by which I
mean also the stage, the rooms behind the scenes, and the
dressing-rooms—was not so much the desire for entertainment and
amusement such as that which impels the present-day theatre-goers,
but the fascinating pleasure of finding myself in an entirely
different atmosphere, in a world that was purely fantastic and
often gruesomely attractive. Thus to me a scene, even a wing,
representing a bush, or some costume or characteristic part of it,
seemed to come from another world, to be in some way as attractive
as an apparition, and I felt that contact with it might serve as a
lever to lift me from the dull reality of daily routine to that
delightful region of spirits. Everything connected with a
theatrical performance had for me the charm of mystery, it both
bewitched and fascinated me, and while I was trying, with the help
of a few playmates, to imitate the performance of Der Freischutz,
and to devote myself energetically to reproducing the needful
costumes and masks in my grotesque style of painting, the more
elegant contents of my sisters’ wardrobes, in the beautifying of
which I had often seen the family occupied, exercised a subtle
charm over my imagination; nay, my heart would beat madly at the
very touch of one of their dresses.
In spite of the fact that, as I
already mentioned, our family was not given to outward
manifestations of affection, yet the fact that I was brought up
entirely among feminine surroundings must necessarily have
influenced the development of the sensitive side of my nature.
Perhaps it was precisely because my immediate circle was generally
rough and impetuous, that the opposite characteristics of
womanhood, especially such as were connected with the imaginary
world of the theatre, created a feeling of such tender longing in
me.
Luckily these fantastic humours,
merging from the gruesome into the mawkish, were counteracted and
balanced by more serious influences undergone at school at the
hands of my teachers and schoolfellows. Even there, it was chiefly
the weird that aroused my keenest interest. I can hardly judge
whether I had what would be called a good head for study. I think
that, in general, what I really liked I was soon able to grasp
without much effort, whereas I hardly exerted myself at all in the
study of subjects that were uncongenial. This characteristic was
most marked in regard to arithmetic and, later on, mathematics. In
neither of these subjects did I ever succeed in bringing my mind
seriously to bear upon the tasks that were set me. In the matter of
the Classics, too, I paid only just as much attention as was
absolutely necessary to enable me to get a grasp of them; for I was
stimulated by the desire to reproduce them to myself dramatically.
In this way Greek particularly attracted me, because the stories
from Greek mythology so seized upon my fancy that I tried to
imagine their heroes as speaking to me in their native tongue, so
as to satisfy my longing for complete familiarity with them. In
these circumstances it will be readily understood that the grammar
of the language seemed to me merely a tiresome obstacle, and by no
means in itself an interesting branch of knowledge.
The fact that my study of
languages was never very thorough, perhaps best explains the fact
that I was afterwards so ready to cease troubling about them
altogether. Not until much later did this study really begin to
interest me again, and that was only when I learnt to understand
its physiological and philosophical side, as it was revealed to our
modern Germanists by the pioneer work of Jakob Grimm. Then, when it
was too late to apply myself thoroughly to a study which at last I
had learned to appreciate, I regretted that this newer conception
of the study of languages had not yet found acceptance in our
colleges when I was younger.
Nevertheless, by my successes in
philological work I managed to attract the attention of a young
teacher at the Kreuz Grammar School, a Master of Arts named Sillig,
who proved very helpful to me. He often permitted me to visit him
and show him my work, consisting of metric translations and a few
original poems, and he always seemed very pleased with my efforts
in recitation. What he thought of me may best be judged perhaps
from the fact that he made me, as a boy of about twelve, recite not
only ‘Hector’s Farewell’ from the Iliad, but even Hamlet’s
celebrated monologue. On one occasion, when I was in the fourth
form of the school, one of my schoolfellows, a boy named Starke,
suddenly fell dead, and the tragic event aroused so much sympathy,
that not only did the whole school attend the funeral, but the
headmaster also ordered that a poem should be written in
commemoration of the ceremony, and that this poem should be
published. Of the various poems submitted, among which there was
one by myself, prepared very hurriedly, none seemed to the master
worthy of the honour which he had promised, and he therefore
announced his intention of substituting one of his own speeches in
the place of our rejected attempts. Much distressed by this
decision, I quickly sought out Professor Sillig, with the view of
urging him to intervene on behalf of my poem. We thereupon went
through it together. Its well-constructed and well-rhymed verses,
written in stanzas of eight lines, determined him to revise the
whole of it carefully. Much of its imagery was bombastic, and far
beyond the conception of a boy of my age. I recollect that in one
part I had drawn extensively from the monologue in Addison’s Cato,
spoken by Cato just before his suicide. I had met with this passage
in an English grammar, and it had made a deep impression upon me.
The words: ‘The stars shall fade away, the sun himself grow dim
with age, and nature sink in years,’ which, at all events, were a
direct plagiarism, made Sillig laugh—a thing at which I was a
little offended. However, I felt very grateful to him, for, thanks
to the care and rapidity with which he cleared my poem of these
extravagances, it was eventually accepted by the headmaster,
printed, and widely circulated.
The effect of this success was
extraordinary, both on my schoolfellows and on my own family. My
mother devoutly folded her hands in thankfulness, and in my own
mind my vocation seemed quite a settled thing. It was clear, beyond
the possibility of a doubt, that I was destined to be a poet.
Professor Sillig wished me to compose a grand epic, and suggested
as a subject ‘The Battle of Parnassus,’ as described by Pausanias.
His reasons for this choice were based upon the legend related by
Pausanias, viz., that in the second century B.C. the Muses from
Parnassus aided the combined Greek armies against the destructive
invasion of the Gauls by provoking a panic among the latter. I
actually began my heroic poem in hexameter verse, but could not get
through the first canto.
Not being far enough advanced in
the language to understand the Greek tragedies thoroughly in the
original, my own attempts to construct a tragedy in the Greek form
were greatly influenced by the fact that quite by accident I came
across August Apel’s clever imitation of this style in his striking
poems ‘Polyidos’ and ‘Aitolier.’ For my theme I selected the death
of Ulysses, from a fable of Hyginus, according to which the aged
hero is killed by his son, the offspring of his union with Calypso.
But I did not get very far with this work either, before I gave it
up.
My mind became so bent upon this
sort of thing, that duller studies naturally ceased to interest me.
The mythology, legends, and, at last, the history of Greece alone
attracted me.
I was fond of life, merry with my
companions, and always ready for a joke or an adventure. Moreover,
I was constantly forming friendships, almost passionate in their
ardour, with one or the other of my comrades, and in choosing my
associates I was mainly influenced by the extent to which my new
acquaintance appealed to my eccentric imagination. At one time it
would be poetising and versifying that decided my choice of a
friend; at another, theatrical enterprises, while now and then it
would be a longing for rambling and mischief.
Furthermore, when I reached my
thirteenth year, a great change came over our family affairs. My
sister Rosalie, who had become the chief support of our household,
obtained an advantageous engagement at the theatre in Prague,
whither mother and children removed in 1820, thus giving up the
Dresden home altogether. I was left behind in Dresden, so that I
might continue to attend the Kreuz Grammar School until I was ready
to go up to the university. I was therefore sent to board and lodge
with a family named Bohme, whose sons I had known at school, and in
whose house I already felt quite at home. With my residence in this
somewhat rough, poor, and not particularly well-conducted family,
my years of dissipation began. I no longer enjoyed the quiet
retirement necessary for work, nor the gentle, spiritual influence
of my sisters’ companionship. On the contrary, I was plunged into a
busy, restless life, full of rough horseplay and of quarrels.
Nevertheless, it was there that I began to experience the influence
of the gentler sex in a manner hitherto unknown to me, as the
grown-up daughters of the family and their friends often filled the
scanty and narrow rooms of the house. Indeed, my first
recollections of boyish love date from this period. I remember a
very beautiful young girl, whose name, if I am not mistaken, was
Amalie Hoffmann, coming to call at the house one Sunday. She was
charmingly dressed, and her appearance as she came into the room
literally struck me dumb with amazement. On other occasions I
recollect pretending to be too helplessly sleepy to move, so that I
might be carried up to bed by the girls, that being, as they
thought, the only remedy for my condition. And I repeated this,
because I found, to my surprise, that their attention under these
circumstances brought me into closer and more gratifying proximity
with them.
The most important event during
this year of separation from my family was, however, a short visit
I paid to them in Prague. In the middle of the winter my mother
came to Dresden, and took me hack with her to Prague for a week.
Her way of travelling was quite unique. To the end of her days she
preferred the more dangerous mode of travelling in a hackney
carriage to the quicker journey by mail-coach, so that we spent
three whole days in the bitter cold on the road from Dresden to
Prague. The journey over the Bohemian mountains often seemed to be
beset with the greatest dangers, but happily we survived our
thrilling adventures and at last arrived in Prague, where I was
suddenly plunged into entirely new surroundings.
For a long time the thought of
leaving Saxony on another visit to Bohemia, and especially Prague,
had had quite a romantic attraction for me. The foreign
nationality, the broken German of the people, the peculiar headgear
of the women, the native wines, the harp-girls and musicians, and
finally, the ever present signs of Catholicism, its numerous
chapels and shrines, all produced on me a strangely exhilarating
impression. This was probably due to my craze for everything
theatrical and spectacular, as distinguished from simple bourgeois
customs. Above all, the antique splendour and beauty of the
incomparable city of Prague became indelibly stamped on my fancy.
Even in my own family surroundings I found attractions to which I
had hitherto been a stranger. For instance, my sister Ottilie, only
two years older than myself, had won the devoted friendship of a
noble family, that of Count Pachta, two of whose daughters, Jenny
and Auguste, who had long been famed as the leading beauties of
Prague, had become fondly attached to her. To me, such people and
such a connection were something quite novel and enchanting.
Besides these, certain beaux esprits of Prague, among them W.
Marsano, a strikingly handsome and charming man, were frequent
visitors at our house. They often earnestly discussed the tales of
Hoffmann, which at that date were comparatively new, and had
created some sensation. It was now that I made my first though
rather superficial acquaintance with this romantic visionary, and
so received a stimulus which influenced me for many years even to
the point of infatuation, and gave me very peculiar ideas of the
world.
In the following spring, 1827, I
repeated this journey from Dresden to Prague, but this time on
foot, and accompanied by my friend Rudolf Bohme. Our tour was full
of adventure. We got to within an hour of Teplitz the first night,
and next day we had to get a lift in a wagon, as we had walked our
feet sore; yet this only took us as far as Lowositz, as our funds
had quite run out. Under a scorching sun, hungry and half-fainting,
we wandered along bypaths through absolutely unknown country, until
at sundown we happened to reach the main road just as an elegant
travelling coach came in sight. I humbled my pride so far as to
pretend I was a travelling journeyman, and begged the distinguished
travellers for alms, while my friend timidly hid himself in the
ditch by the roadside. Luckily we decided to seek shelter for the
night in an inn, where we took counsel whether we should spend the
alms just received on a supper or a bed. We decided for the supper,
proposing to spend the night under the open sky. While we were
refreshing ourselves, a strange-looking wayfarer entered. He wore a
black velvet skull-cap, to which a metal lyre was attached like a
cockade, and on his back he bore a harp. Very cheerfully he set
down his instrument, made himself comfortable, and called for a
good meal. He intended to stay the night, and to continue his way
next day to Prague, where he lived, and whither he was returning
from Hanover.
My good spirits and courage were
stimulated by the jovial manners of this merry fellow, who
constantly repeated his favourite motto, ‘non plus ultra.’ We soon
struck up an acquaintance, and in return for my confidence, the
strolling player’s attitude to me was one of almost touching
sympathy. It was agreed that we should continue our journey
together next day on foot. He lent me two twenty-kreutzer pieces
(about ninepence), and allowed me to write my Prague address in his
pocket-book. I was highly delighted at this personal success. My
harpist grew extravagantly merry; a good deal of Czernosek wine was
drunk; he sang and played on his harp like a madman, continually
reiterating his ‘non plus ultra’ till at last, overcome with wine,
he fell down on the straw, which had been spread out on the floor
for our common bed. When the sun once more peeped in, we could not
rouse him, and we had to make up our minds to set off in the
freshness of the early morning without him, feeling convinced that
the sturdy fellow would overtake us during the day. But it was in
vain that we looked out for him on the road and during our
subsequent stay in Prague. Indeed, it was not until several weeks
later that the extraordinary fellow turned up at my mother’s, not
so much to collect payment of his loan, as to inquire about the
welfare of the young friend to whom that loan had been made.
The remainder of our journey was
very fatiguing, and the joy I felt when I at last beheld Prague
from the summit of a hill, at about an hour’s distance, simply
beggars description. Approaching the suburbs, we were for the
second time met by a splendid carriage, from which my sister
Ottilie’s two lovely friends called out to me in astonishment. They
had recognised me immediately, in spite of my terribly sunburnt
face, blue linen blouse, and bright red cotton cap. Overwhelmed
with shame, and with my heart beating like mad, I could hardly
utter a word, and hurried away to my mother’s to attend at once to
the restoration of my sunburnt complexion. To this task I devoted
two whole days, during which I swathed my face in parsley
poultices; and not till then did I seek the pleasures of society.
When, on the return journey, I looked back once more on Prague from
the same hilltop, I burst into tears, flung myself on the earth,
and for a long time could not be induced by my astonished companion
to pursue the journey. I was downcast for the rest of the way, and
we arrived home in Dresden without any further adventures.
During the same year I again
gratified my fancy for long excursions on foot by joining a
numerous company of grammar school boys, consisting of pupils of
several classes and of various ages, who had decided to spend their
summer holidays in a tour to Leipzig. This journey also stands out
among the memories of my youth, by reason of the strong impressions
it left behind. The characteristic feature of our party was that we
all aped the student, by behaving and dressing extravagantly in the
most approved student fashion. After going as far as Meissen on the
market-boat, our path lay off the main road, through villages with
which I was as yet unfamiliar. We spent the night in the vast barn
of a village inn, and our adventures were of the wildest
description. There we saw a large marionette show, with almost
life-sized figures. Our entire party settled themselves in the
auditorium, where their presence was a source of some anxiety to
the managers, who had only reckoned on an audience of peasants.
Genovefa was the play given. The ceaseless silly jests, and
constant interpolations and jeering interruptions, in which our
corps of embryo-students indulged, finally aroused the anger even
of the peasants, who had come prepared to weep. I believe I was the
only one of our party who was pained by these impertinences, and in
spite of involuntary laughter at some of my comrades’ jokes, I not
only defended the play itself, but also its original, simple-minded
audience. A popular catch-phrase which occurred in the piece has
ever since remained stamped on my memory. ‘Golo’ instructs the
inevitable Kaspar that, when the Count Palatine returns home, he
must ‘tickle him behind, so that he should feel it in front’
(hinten zu kitzeln, dass er es vorne fuhle). Kaspar conveys Golo’s
order verbatim to the Count, and the latter reproaches the unmasked
rogue in the following terms, uttered with the greatest pathos: ‘O
Golo, Golo! thou hast told Kaspar to tickle me behind, so that I
shall feel it in front!’
From Grimma our party rode into
Leipzig in open carriages, but not until we had first carefully
removed all the outward emblems of the undergraduate, lest the
local students we were likely to meet might make us rue our
presumption.
Since my first visit, when I was
eight years old, I had only once returned to Leipzig, and then for
a very brief stay, and under circumstances very similar to those of
the earlier visit. I now renewed my fantastic impressions of the
Thome house, but this time, owing to my more advanced education, I
looked forward to more intelligent intercourse with my uncle
Adolph. An opening for this was soon provided by my joyous
astonishment on learning that a bookcase in the large anteroom,
containing a goodly collection of books, was my property, having
been left me by my father. I went through the books with my uncle,
selected at once a number of Latin authors in the handsome
Zweibruck edition, along with sundry attractive looking works of
poetry and belles-lettres, and arranged for them to be sent to
Dresden. During this visit I was very much interested in the life
of the students. In addition to my impressions of the theatre and
of Prague, now came those of the so-called swaggering
undergraduate. A great change had taken place in this class. When,
as a lad of eight, I had my first glimpse of students, their long
hair, their old German costume with the black velvet skull-cap and
the shirt collar turned back from the bare neck, had quite taken my
fancy. But since that time the old student ‘associations’ which
affected this fashion had disappeared in the face of police
prosecutions. On the other hand, the national student clubs, no
less peculiar to Germans, had become conspicuous. These clubs
adopted, more or less, the fashion of the day, but with some little
exaggeration. Albeit, their dress was clearly distinguishable from
that of other classes, owing to its picturesqueness, and especially
its display of the various club-colours. The ‘Comment,’ that
compendium of pedantic rules of conduct for the preservation of a
defiant and exclusive esprit de corps, as opposed to the bourgeois
classes, had its fantastic side, just as the most philistine
peculiarities of the Germans have, if you probe them deeply enough.
To me it represented the idea of emancipation from the yoke of
school and family. The longing to become a student coincided
unfortunately with my growing dislike for drier studies and with my
ever-increasing fondness for cultivating romantic poetry. The
results of this soon showed themselves in my resolute attempts to
make a change.
At the time of my confirmation,
at Easter, 1827, I had considerable doubt about this ceremony, and
I already felt a serious falling off of my reverence for religious
observances. The boy who, not many years before, had gazed with
agonised sympathy on the altarpiece in the Kreuz Kirche (Church of
the Holy Cross), and had yearned with ecstatic fervour to hang upon
the Cross in place of the Saviour, had now so far lost his
veneration for the clergyman, whose preparatory confirmation
classes he attended, as to be quite ready to make fun of him, and
even to join with his comrades in withholding part of his class
fees, and spending the money in sweets. How matters stood with me
spiritually was revealed to me, almost to my horror, at the
Communion service, when I walked in procession with my
fellow-communicants to the altar to the sound of organ and choir.
The shudder with which I received the Bread and Wine was so
ineffaceably stamped on my memory, that I never again partook of
the Communion, lest I should do so with levity. To avoid this was
all the easier for me, seeing that among Protestants such
participation is not compulsory.
I soon, however, seized, or
rather created, an opportunity of forcing a breach with the Kreuz
Grammar School, and thus compelled my family to let me go to
Leipzig. In self-defence against what I considered an unjust
punishment with which I was threatened by the assistant headmaster,
Baumgarten-Crusius, for whom I otherwise had great respect, I asked
to be discharged immediately from the school on the ground of
sudden summons to join my family in Leipzig. I had already left the
Bohme household three months before, and now lived alone in a small
garret, where I was waited on by the widow of a court plate-washer,
who at every meal served up the familiar thin Saxon coffee as
almost my sole nourishment. In this attic I did little else but
write verses. Here, too, I formed the first outlines of that
stupendous tragedy which afterwards filled my family with such
consternation. The irregular habits I acquired through this
premature domestic independence induced my anxious mother to
consent very readily to my removal to Leipzig, the more so as a
part of our scattered family had already migrated there.
My longing for Leipzig,
originally aroused by the fantastic impressions I had gained there,
and later by my enthusiasm for a student’s life, had recently been
still further stimulated. I had seen scarcely anything of my sister
Louisa, at that time a girl of about twenty-two, as she had gone to
the theatre of Breslau shortly after our stepfather’s death. Quite
recently she had been in Dresden for a few days on her way to
Leipzig, having accepted an engagement at the theatre there. This
meeting with my almost unknown sister, her hearty manifestations of
joy at seeing me again, as well as her sprightly, merry
disposition, quite won my heart. To live with her seemed an
alluring prospect, especially as my mother and Ottilie had joined
her for a while. For the first time a sister had treated me with
some tenderness. When at last I reached Leipzig at Christmas in the
same year (1827), and there found my mother with Ottilie and
Cecilia (my half-sister), I fancied myself in heaven. Great
changes, however, had already taken place. Louisa was betrothed to
a respected and well-to-do bookseller, Friedrich Brockhaus. This
gathering together of the relatives of the penniless bride-elect
did not seem to trouble her remarkably kind-hearted fiance. But my
sister may have become uneasy on the subject, for she soon gave me
to understand that she was not taking it quite in good part. Her
desire to secure an entree into the higher social circles of
bourgeois life naturally produced a marked change in her manner, at
one time so full of fun, and of this I gradually became so keenly
sensible that finally we were estranged for a time. Moreover, I
unfortunately gave her good cause to reprove my conduct. After I
got to Leipzig I quite gave up my studies and all regular school
work, probably owing to the arbitrary and pedantic system in vogue
at the school there.
In Leipzig there were two
higher-class schools, one called St. Thomas’s School, and the
other, and the more modern, St. Nicholas’s School. The latter at
that time enjoyed a better reputation than the former; so there I
had to go. But the council of teachers before whom I appeared for
my entrance examination at the New Year (1828) thought fit to
maintain the dignity of their school by placing me for a time in
the upper third form, whereas at the Kreuz Grammar School in
Dresden I had been in the second form. My disgust at having to lay
aside my Homer—from which I had already made written translations
of twelve songs—and take up the lighter Greek prose writers was
indescribable. It hurt my feelings so deeply, and so influenced my
behaviour, that I never made a friend of any teacher in the school.
The unsympathetic treatment I met with made me all the more
obstinate, and various other circumstances in my position only
added to this feeling. While student life, as I saw it day by day,
inspired me ever more and more with its rebellious spirit, I
unexpectedly met with another cause for despising the dry monotony
of school regime. I refer to the influence of my uncle, Adolph
Wagner, which, though he was long unconscious of it, went a long
way towards moulding the growing stripling that I then was.
The fact that my romantic tastes
were not based solely on a tendency to superficial amusement was
shown by my ardent attachment to this learned relative. In his
manner and conversation he was certainly very attractive; the
many-sidedness of his knowledge, which embraced not only philology
but also philosophy and general poetic literature, rendered
intercourse with him a most entertaining pastime, as all those who
knew him used to admit. On the other hand, the fact that he was
denied the gift of writing with equal charm, or clearness, was a
singular defect which seriously lessened his influence upon the
literary world, and, in fact, often made him appear ridiculous, as
in a written argument he would perpetrate the most pompous and
involved sentences. This weakness could not have alarmed me,
because in the hazy period of my youth the more incomprehensible
any literary extravagance was, the more I admired it; besides
which, I had more experience of his conversation than of his
writings. He also seemed to find pleasure in associating with the
lad who could listen with so much heart and soul. Yet
unfortunately, possibly in the fervour of his discourses, of which
he was not a little proud, he forgot that their substance, as well
as their form, was far above my youthful powers of comprehension. I
called daily to accompany him on his constitutional walk beyond the
city gates, and I shrewdly suspect that we often provoked the
smiles of those passers-by who overheard the profound and often
earnest discussions between us. The subjects generally ranged over
everything serious or sublime throughout the whole realm of
knowledge. I took the most enthusiastic interest in his copious
library, and tasted eagerly of almost all branches of literature,
without really grounding myself in any one of them.
My uncle was delighted to find in
me a very willing listener to his recital of classic tragedies. He
had made a translation of Oedipus, and, according to his intimate
friend Tieck, justly flattered himself on being an excellent
reader.
I remember once, when he was
sitting at his desk reading out a Greek tragedy to me, it did not
annoy him when I fell fast asleep, and he afterwards pretended he
had not noticed it. I was also induced to spend my evenings with
him, owing to the friendly and genial hospitality his wife showed
me. A very great change had come over my uncle’s life since my
first acquaintance with him at Jeannette Thome’s. The home which
he, together with his sister Friederike, had found in his friend’s
house seemed, as time went on, to have brought in its train duties
that were irksome. As his literary work assured him a modest
income, he eventually deemed it more in accordance with his dignity
to make a home of his own. A friend of his, of the same age as
himself, the sister of the aesthete Wendt of Leipzig, who
afterwards became famous, was chosen by him to keep house for him.
Without saying a word to Jeannette, instead of going for his usual
afternoon walk he went to the church with his chosen bride, and got
through the marriage ceremonies as quickly as possible; and it was
only on his return that he informed us he was leaving, and would
have his things removed that very day. He managed to meet the
consternation, perhaps also the reproaches, of his elderly friend
with quiet composure; and to the end of his life he continued his
regular daily visits to ‘Mam’selle Thome,’ who at times would coyly
pretend to sulk. It was only poor Friederike who seemed obliged at
times to atone for her brother’s sudden unfaithfulness.
What attracted me in my uncle
most strongly was his blunt contempt of the modern pedantry in
State, Church, and School, to which he gave vent with some humour.
Despite the great moderation of his usual views on life, he yet
produced on me the effect of a thorough free-thinker. I was highly
delighted by his contempt for the pedantry of the schools. Once,
when I had come into serious conflict with all the teachers of the
Nicolai School, and the rector of the school had approached my
uncle, as the only male representative of my family, with a serious
complaint about my behaviour, my uncle asked me during a stroll
round the town, with a calm smile as though he were speaking to one
of his own age, what I had been up to with the people at school. I
explained the whole affair to him, and described the punishment to
which I had been subjected, and which seemed to me unjust. He
pacified me, and exhorted me to be patient, telling me to comfort
myself with the Spanish proverb, un rey no puede morir, which he
explained as meaning that the ruler of a school must of necessity
always be in the right.
He could not, of course, help
noticing, to his alarm, the effect upon me of this kind of
conversation, which I was far too young to appreciate. Although it
annoyed me one day, when I wanted to begin reading Goethe’s Faust,
to hear him say quietly that I was too young to understand it, yet,
according to my thinking, his other conversations about our own
great poets, and even about Shakespeare and Dante, had made me so
familiar with these sublime figures that I had now for some time
been secretly busy working out the great tragedy I had already
conceived in Dresden. Since my trouble at school I had devoted all
my energies, which ought by rights to have been exclusively
directed to my school duties, to the accomplishment of this task.
In this secret work I had only one confidante, my sister Ottilie,
who now lived with me at my mother’s. I can remember the misgivings
and alarm which the first confidential communication of my great
poetic enterprise aroused in my good sister; yet she affectionately
suffered the tortures I sometimes inflicted on her by reciting to
her in secret, but not without emotion, portions of my work as it
progressed. Once, when I was reciting to her one of the most
gruesome scenes, a heavy thunderstorm came on. When the lightning
flashed quite close to us, and the thunder rolled, my sister felt
bound to implore me to stop; but she soon found it was hopeless,
and continued to endure it with touching devotion.
But a more significant storm was
brewing on the horizon of my life. My neglect of school reached
such a point that it could not but lead to a rupture. Whilst my
dear mother had no presentiment of this, I awaited the catastrophe
with longing rather than with fear.
In order to meet this crisis with
dignity I at length decided to surprise my family by disclosing to
them the secret of my tragedy, which was now completed. They were
to be informed of this great event by my uncle. I thought I could
rely upon his hearty recognition of my vocation as a great poet on
account of the deep harmony between us on all other questions of
life, science, and art. I therefore sent him my voluminous
manuscript, with a long letter which I thought would please him
immensely. In this I communicated to him first my ideas with regard
to the St. Nicholas’s School, and then my firm determination from
that time forward not to allow any mere school pedantry to check my
free development. But the event turned out very different from what
I had expected. It was a great shock to them. My uncle, quite
conscious that he had been indiscreet, paid a visit to my mother
and brother-in-law, in order to report the misfortune that had
befallen the family, reproaching himself for the fact that his
influence over me had not always, perhaps, been for my good. To me
he wrote a serious letter of discouragement; and to this day I
cannot understand why he showed so small a sense of humour in
understanding my bad behaviour. To my surprise he merely said that
he reproached himself for having corrupted me by conversations
unsuited to my years, but he made no attempt to explain to me
good-naturedly the error of my ways.
The crime this boy of fifteen had
committed was, as I said before, to have written a great tragedy,
entitled Leubald und Adelaïde.