[humanities.music.composers.wagner] Wagner Books FAQ

[Derrick Everett]

Archive-name: music/wagner/books-faq
Expires: 15 January 2004 06:00:01 GMT
Last-modified: 16 November 2003 11:15:00 GMT
Posting-Frequency: quarterly
Summary: Bibliographical FAQ for newsgroup humanities.music.composers.wagner.
URL: http://home.no/derrick/booksfaq.htm
Version: 1.16

Wagner Books FAQ for humanities.music.composers.wagner

This is the list of Wagner-related books for humanities.music.composers.wagner
(hmcw). Given that the primary language of the newsgroup is English, this
FAQ concentrates on titles that are available (although not necessarily in
print) in that language. Where a book is a translation of an original in
another language, the original title is also provided and the original
language is indicated. A few books of particular interest, published in
other languages but not available in English translation, are included.

This list only scratches the surface of a vast literature. Many of the
books listed here contain their own bibliography, which will be of
assistance to those readers who wish to explore specific subjects in
more depth. In addition to the books listed here, there is an extensive
Wagner literature in German, French and other languages. Various academic
journals and other publications, such as the programme books of the
Bayreuth Festival, contain many articles about Wagner, his writings and
his musical and dramatic works.

This booklist is a supplement to the main FAQ for hmcw which can be found at:
http://home.c2i.net/monsalvat/wagnerfaq.htm (HTML version)
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/music/wagner/general-faq/ (plain-text version)

Recently updated or new entries are marked with a * at the beginning of the
line in the table of contents. This version supersedes all previous versions.

----------------------------------------

The bibliographic fields used are as follows:

%T Title. Except where otherwise indicated: where the book described is a
translation, the title of the translation appears first, followed by the
original title in the original language. Some books have alternative titles,
for example a US title and a UK title, or the respective titles of the paper-
back and hardback editions.

%M Language. Where the book described is a translation, this is the language
of the original, not the language of the book described. Where the book is
neither a translation nor in English, this field indicates the language,
which should be obvious from the %T field anyway. The original language is
not necessarily the language of first publication.

%A Author(s) or editor(s). The latter are indicated by (ed). Where the book
described is a translation there might be listed both the editor of the
original and the editor of the translation.

%F Translator(s).

%D Date of last known publication. Where relevant the date of original
publication is given in the %O field.

%C Place(s) of publication.

%I Publisher(s). Some of the books have been republished several times by
different publishers.

%G Identification. Usually this is an ISBN number or numbers. Older books
do not have ISBN numbers.

%S Series. Where appropriate.

%V Volume. Either the volume number (in a series) or the number of volumes.

%K Keywords - removed.

%X Abstract. In some cases this is a mini-review of the book.

%O Other information. For example, who provided the foreword, or the date
of original publication in the language of first publication, with original
publisher where known.

----------------------------------------

Table of Contents

I. Introductory reading (4)

II. Biographical
A. Autobiography (1)
* B. Biographies of Richard Wagner (40)
* C. Biographies of Cosima Wagner (5)
D. Other Biographical Studies (3)
E. Wagner and his Circle (6)
* F. Wagner and his Contemporaries (5)

* III. General Titles about Richard Wagner (24)

IV. Books about Specific Works
A. Der fliegende Holländer (1)
* B. Tannhäuser (2)
* C. Lohengrin (5)
* D. Der Ring des Nibelungen (41)
E. Tristan und Isolde (5)
* F. Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (6)
* G. Parsifal (10)
* H. Other Works (2)
I. Musical Analysis (2)
J. Other Commentary (12)
K. Libretto Translations (4)

V. Books about Specialised Topics
A. Literature (4)
B. Philosophy (3)
* C. Politics (8)
D. Religion (5)
* E. Sex and Gender (4)
F. Theatre (6)
G. Other (4)

VI. Wagner's Own Writings and Correspondence
A. Correspondence (16)
B. Diaries of Richard and Cosima Wagner (3)
C. Prose Writings (9)

VII. Wagner Family and Bayreuth (18)

* VIII. Wagnerism and Wagnerites (5)

* IX. Staging Wagnerian Drama (9)

X. Discographies (2)

XI. Comics and Wagnerian Humour
A. Comics (2)
B. Novels (3)

XII. Acknowledgements and Copyright

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Subject: I. Introductory Reading

If you know little or nothing about Richard Wagner or his works, then
these books are a good place to start.

%T Wagner Without Fear : Learning to Love - and Even Enjoy - Opera's Most
Demanding Genius
%A William Berger
%D 1998
%C New York
%I Vintage Books
%G ISBN 0 3757 0054 4 pbk
%X A gentle introduction to Wagner's works in general, and a more detailed
account of each of the ten stage works in the Bayreuth canon.

%T Richard Wagner's Music Dramas
%T Richard Wagners Musikdramen
%M German
%A Carl Dahlhaus
%F Mary Whittall
%D 1979
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN hbk 0 5212 2397 0, pbk 0 5214 2899 8
%X One essay for each of the ten stage works in the Bayreuth canon.
Michael Tanner writes: "Carl Dahlhaus ... gives perhaps the most
succinct and helpful account of the specific dramatic and musical
features of each work, while largely abstaining from giving his view of
their import, or from passing any judgements".
%O German original published in 1971.

%T Wagner Nights (UK title)
%T The Wagner Operas (US title)
%A Ernest Newman
%D 1977
%C London
%I Pan Books Ltd
%G ISBN 0 3302 5070 1
%X An authoritative introduction to each of the ten operas in the Bayreuth
canon. Although this book provides a detailed summary both of the dramatic
action and the music, and useful information on the sources and the process
of creation respectively of each work, it provides no interpretation of the
dramas. Michael Tanner writes: "Some of his research is invariably
dated, but not seriously so. Given the usual misery of reading opera
plots, it is an astonishingly enjoyable book".
%O Originally published in 1949 but still relevant today.

%T Guide des Operas de Wagner
%A Michel Pazdro
%A Jean Cabourg
%A Dominique Jameux
%M French
%D 1988
%C Paris
%I Fayard
%X Libretti with French translation, thematic guide, analysis, discography.
%O New edition.

------------------------------

Subject: II. Biographical

Many biographies have been written about Richard Wagner: this list is
by no means exhaustive. There are also biographies of Cosima Wagner.

------------------------------

Subject: A. Autobiography

%T My Life
%T Mein Leben
%M German
%A Richard Wagner
%A Martin Gregor-Dellin (ed)
%A Mary Whittall (ed)
%F Andrew Gray
%D 1983
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 5212 2929 4
%X Richard Wagner's autobiography, as dictated to Cosima. A limited
edition was published during Wagner's lifetime (Basle 1870-75; Bayreuth
1880-81), but after Richard's death, it was recalled and most copies
were destroyed, on the orders of Cosima Wagner. First public edition
Munich 1911, second edition 1915, both with some passages suppressed.
Critical edition of the German text 1963. Take it with a pinch of salt.
%O

------------------------------
Subject: B. Biographies of Richard Wagner

In addition to some of the biographies listed here, Deathridge and
Dahlhaus include among the "principal biographies" those by M. Koch
("Richard Wagner", Berlin, 1907-18), and M. Fehr ("Richard Wagners
Schweitzer Zeit", Aarau/Leipzig 1934 and Arrau/Frankfurt a.M., 1954),
neither of which appear to have been translated into English.

%T Wagner, a Biography : with a Selection of Books, Editions and Recordings
%A Robert Anderson
%D 1980
%C London and Hamden, Conn.
%I C. Bingley, Linnet Books
%S The Concertgoer's Companions
%G ISBN 0 2080 1677 5
%X With bibliography and discography.

%T Wagner and his Music Dramas
%A Robert C. Bagar
%D 1950
%C New York
%I Grosset & Dunlap; NY Philharmonic Symphony Society
%X A pocket guide to the composer and his canonical dramas.
%O Originally published in 1943.

%T Richard Wagner : His Life in His Work
%T Wagner: Das Leben im Werke
%M German
%A Paul Bekker
%F M. M. Bozman
%D 1981 (reprint)
%C London
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 8371 3443 9
%X This is a highly readable biography of the old-fashioned kind. While
some details have been corrected by later scholarship, this does not
detract from the value of the book as an introduction to Wagner's life
and work. Each chapter concentrates on one or more of the thirteen
operas, providing biographical background and introducing the opera, in
the order in which the music was written. Thus one chapter is devoted to
the creation of the 'Ring', while later chapters provide the background
to 'Siegfried' act 3 and 'Götterdämmerung' respectively; one chapter is
devoted to the creation of 'Tannhäuser' and a later chapter considers
the rewrite for Paris (the 'Venusberg') and ensuing scandal.
%O Original version was published in 1924 and the translation in 1931.

%T Richard Wagner : His Life and Works from 1813 to 1834
%A Mary Burrell
%A John N. Burk (ed)
%D 1972 (reprint)
%C London
%I Vienna House Inc
%G ISBN 0 8443 0031 4
%X See also (section VI) the edition of letters collected by Mrs. Burrell.
%O Originally published in 1898.

%T Richard Wagner
%T Richard Wagner : Mit zahlreichen Porträts, Faksimiles, Illustrationen
und Beilagen
%M German
%A Houston Stewart Chamberlain
%F George Ainslie Hight
%D 1900
%C London
%I J. M. Dent & Co.
%V 2 volumes
%X
%O German original published in 1896, Munich. This edition reprinted 1915,
1925.

%T Wagner
%A John Chancellor
%D 1978 and 1980
%C London
%I Weidenfeld and Nicolson hbk, Panther pbk
%G ISBN 0 2977 7429 8
%X One of the first biographies to make extensive use of Cosima Wagner's
Diaries, then newly published. With bibliography.

%T Wagner, the Man and his Music
%A John Culshaw
%A Gerald Fitzgerald
%D 1978 and 1979
%C New York and London
%I E. P. Dutton, Hutchinson
%S Composer Series - Met Opera Guild
%X

%T The New Grove Wagner
%A John Deathridge and Carl Dahlhaus
%D 1984
%C London
%I W. W. Norton & Co
%G ISBN 0 3933 1590 8 pbk
%S New Grove Composer Biographies
%X A critical biography that destroys some of the myths created by Wagner
and later perpetuated by Glasenapp, Ellis and von Westernhagen. Given its
origin in a dictionary article, it is understandable that this book
emphasises the facts about Wagner and his works, and that it provides
little criticism or interpretation. The final chapters, concerning the
operas and music-dramas, are essentially an abridged version of Dahlhaus'
book 'Richard Wagner's Music Dramas'. There are useful appendices including
a list of Wagner's musical and dramatic works (based on the WWV catalogue),
a list of his writings and speeches, and an extensive bibliography. If,
like Mr. Gradgrind, you want facts alone, then this is the biography to
obtain.
%O Reprinted in 1997.

%T Life of Richard Wagner : Being an Authorized English Version of
'Das Leben Richard Wagners'
%M Earlier chapters originally written by Glasenapp in German.
%A William Ashton Ellis
%A Carl Friedrich Glasenapp
%D 1977 (reprint)
%C London
%I Da Capo Press Inc
%V 6 volumes
%X The first part of Glasenapp's biography translated into English and
enlarged by Wm. Ashton Ellis. Glasenapp is generally regarded as having
continued the process of myth-making that Wagner himself began in 'Mein
Leben'.
%O Ellis's biography was originally published 1900-08, Kegan Paul & Co.,
London. Glasenapp's biography was first published in 1894.

%T Wagner and His Works : the Story of his Life, with Critical Comments
%A Henry Theophilus Finck
%D 1968 (reprint)
%C New York
%I Greenwood Press
%X
%V 2 volumes.
%O Originally published in 1893 by Charles Scribner's Sons, NY, and by
H. Grevel and Co, London.

%T Richard Wagner
%A Hans Gal
%F Hans-Hubert Schonzeler.
%D 1976
%C New York
%I Stein and Day
%G ISBN 0 8128 1942 X
%X Part 1: The life of an adventurer. Part 2: The man and his music.
%O German original published in 1963.

%T Richard Wagner : an Introduction
%A Isaac Goldberg
%D 1924
%C Girard, Kansas
%I Haldeman-Julius Company
%X

%T The Illustrated Lives of the Great Composers : Wagner
%A Howard Gray
%D 1990
%C London, New York and Sydney
%I Omnibus Press
%G ISBN 0 7119 1687 X pbk
%X Wagner's life in words and pictures.

%T Richard Wagner : His Life, His Work, His Century
%T Wagner-Chronik : Daten zu Leben und Werk
%M German
%A Martin Gregor-Dellin
%F J. Maxwell Brownjohn
%D 1983
%C London
%I Collins
%X Abridged version of the German original. With bibliography.

%T Richard Wagner : The Man, His Mind and His Music
%A Robert Gutman
%D 1990 (revised edition)
%C London and San Diego; Toronto
%I Harcourt Brace Jovanovich; Harcourt
%G ISBN 0 1567 7615 4 hbk (1968), ISBN 0 1567 7610 3 pbk (1971),
ISBN 0 1567 7615 4 pbk (1990)
%X Gutman has been criticized by Wagner scholars for selective
quotation, for misrepresenting his sources and for his bizarre
interpretations of Wagner's operas. Despite this, his book has been very
popular in the USA, where it has poisoned the minds of an entire
generation.
On the basis of one word in the libretto -- which is probably a misprint
-- he claims that 'Tristan und Isolde' is about a triangular
relationship between the title characters and Tristan's boyfriend,
Melot. His interpretation of 'Parsifal' rests upon the assumption that
the libretto was influenced by the racial theories of the self-styled
'Count' Gobineau, despite the fact that Wagner had not read anything by
Gobineau until three years after he had completed his libretto.
Gutman portrays Wagner as a sociopathic monster and as a proto-Nazi.
According to Gutman, compared to Wagner, Adolf Hitler was a liberal.
Some Wagnerians, including the editor of this FAQ, believe that Gutman
has done great damage through his influence on other authors and on
producers of Wagner's works. In general Gutman's approach is to gainsay
Wagner's more scholarly biographers where there is a consensus and to
agree with the minority where they are divided, except where the
majority view is critical of Wagner.
The revised edition fails to correct many of the misconceptions,
mistranslations, and errors both of fact and of judgement that disfigured
the first edition.
%O Originally published in 1968, appearing in paperback in 1971.

%T Richard Wagner
%A Sir William Henry Hadow
%D 1934
%C London
%I Thornton Butterworth, Ltd.
%X An entertaining biography that would make a good short introduction
to Wagner's life and works. Apart from 'Mein Leben' (in which Hadow
places a little too much faith) and various editions of Wagner's
letters, Hadow has distilled and condensed his material from the more
substantial biographies already published: primarily those by Bekker,
Chamberlain, Ellis, Finck, Hight and Wallace, the memoirs of Praeger,
Newman's 'Wagner as Man and Artist' and the first volume of his
monumental biography. In other words the book is mostly derivative.
There are some minor errors, some of which suggest that Hadow was not
intimately familiar with Wagner's scores; he is careless with dates.

%T Richard Wagner, His Life and His Dramas : A Biographical Study of the
Man and an Explanation of His Work
%A William James Henderson
%D 1990 (reprint)
%C
%I Reprint Services Corporation
%G ISBN 0 7812 9098 8
%O Originally published in 1901 by G.P.Putnam's sons, NY and London.
Republished in 1923. Reprinted in 1971, AMS Press, NY.

%T Richard Wagner : A Critical Biography
%A George Ainslie Hight
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C
%I Best Books
%V 2 volumes.
%X As well as an account of Wagner's life this book provides an
introduction to the major works, with extensive discussion of their
musical form and content.
%O Originally published in 1925 by Arrowsmith, London.

%T Richard Wagner, 1813-1883
%A Francis Hueffer
%D 1934
%C London
%I Sampson, Low, Marston and Co., Ltd.
%X
%O First published in 1872, London.

%T Wagner
%A Robert L. Jacobs
%D 1965
%C London
%I J.M. Dent and Sons
%G ISBN
%S The Master Musicians
%X
%O

%T Wagner and the Romantic Disaster
%A Burnett James
%D 1983
%C New York and Tunbridge Wells
%I Hippocrene, Midas.
%G ISBN 0 8825 4667 8
%X With bibliography.

%T Richard Wagner : His Life and Works
%M French
%A Adolphe Jullien
%F Florence Percival Hall
%F B.J. Lang (introduction)
%D Original 1892, reprint 1981
%C Boston; Neptune NJ
%I Millet; Paganiniana Publications
%G Reprint: ISBN 0 8766 6579 2
%V 2 volumes
%X With illustrations by Fantin-Latour.

%T Portrait of Wagner : an Illustrated Biography
%T Richard Wagner in Selbstzeugnissen und Bilddokumenten
%M German
%A Hans Mayer
%F Robert Nowell
%D 1972
%C New York
%I Herder and Herder
%X

%T Wagner
%A Barry Millington
%D 1984
%C London
%I J.M.Dent and Sons Ltd
%G ISBN 0 460 86069 0
%S The Master Musicians
%X Considered by many to be the best single-volume introduction to
Wagner's life and works. Millington is particularly concerned with
Wagner's anti-Semitic and racial obsessions; it has been suggested
that Millington is the one with the obsession. Appendices include
a detailed chronology and a bibliography.

%T Richard Wagner : a Sketch of his Life and Works
%M German
%A Franz Muncker
%A Heinrich Nisle (illustrator)
%F D. Landman
%D 1891
%C Bamberg
%I Buchner
%X

%T The Life of Richard Wagner
%A Ernest Newman
%D 1976
%C Cambridge
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 521 29149 6
%V 4 volumes
%X Despite it being more than 50 years old, and written at a time when
many primary sources were suppressed or difficult to obtain, this is
still considered to be one of the most authoritative Wagner biographies
in English. Newman had his blind spots, however; as Bryan Magee has
pointed out, he was inaccurate when writing about Schopenhauer and his
influence on Wagner; and Walker described his treatment of Franz Liszt
as "character assassination".
%O Originally published in 1933-47

%T Wagner as Man and Artist
%A Ernest Newman
%D 1963, reprints 1969 and 1989
%C London and NY
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd; Cape; Limelight Editions
%G ISBN 0 2246 1586 6 and ISBN 0 8446 2653 8
%X An expanded version of the 1914 original. Neither as detailed nor as
informative as Newman's biography (see above). In the 1914 edition
Newman provided the first objective account of the Jessie Laussot
affair. J.K. Holman writes that Newman "cleared away a vast underbrush
of inadequate Wagner commentary ... he separated fact from fiction with
regard to aspects of Wagner's personal life, which had been rigidly
protected and/or extravagantly reinvented by the composer himself in the
autobiography 'Mein Leben', and subsequently by his wife, Cosima.
Newman also separated sense from nonsense in Wagner's extensive
theoretical writings ..."
%O Originally published by J.M. Dent and Sons, London and Toronto.
Republished in 1925 by John Lane at The Bodley Head, London.

%T Wagner and his World
%A Charles Osborne
%D 1977
%C London and New York
%I Thames and Hudson, Charles Scribner's Sons
%G ISBN 0 5001 3060 4
%X Traces Wagner's life through hardships, debt, political exile, long
artistic frustrations and triumphant successes. With 142 b&w pictures.
%O

%T Wagner
%A Elaine Padmore
%D 1971 and 1973
%C London and New York
%I Faber and Faber Ltd., T. Y. Crowell Co.
%G ISBN 0 5710 8785 X
%X

%T Richard Wagner : the Story of an Artist
%T Wagner, histoire d'un artiste
%M French
%A Guy Comte de Pourtalès
%F Lewis May
%D 1972 (reprint)
%C Westport, Conn.
%I Greenwood Press
%X
%O Originally published in 1932 by Harper and Brothers.

%T Richard Wagner
%A Robert Raphael
%D 1969
%C New York
%I Twayne Publishers
%G ISBN 0 8057 2976 3
%X With bibliography. Michael Tanner writes concerning Raphael's account
of the works: "Robert Raphael ... is entirely concerned to elucidate
their significance, and mainly does so very well, though one often feels
he could be writing about spoken dramas".

%T Richard Wagner : Titan of Music
%A Monroe Stearns
%D 1969
%C New York
%I F. Watts
%S Immortals of Music
%X

%T The Real Wagner
%A Rudolph Sabor
%D 1987
%C London
%I Andre Deutsch
%X This biographical study consists of a series of essays, each of them
considering a different aspect of Wagner's character, yet also tracing
the story of Wagner's life. Much of that story is told in the words of
Wagner and his correspondents. The book is beautifully illustrated and
obviously a labour of love.
%O Foreword by Wolfgang Wagner.

%T Wagner
%A Michael Tanner
%D 1995
%C Cambridge UK, Princeton NJ
%I Cambridge Univ. Press, Princeton Univ. Press
%G ISBN 0 0025 5532 8, ISBN 0 6910 1162 1
%X This is more a series of essays than a complete biography. Tanner's
conservative and romantic viewpoint (he writes on opera for the
'Spectator') makes an interesting contrast to the more radical and
analytical approach of Millington, with whom Tanner has crossed swords.
Includes a chronology and a short but informative bibliography.

%T Richard Wagner : His Life, Art and Thought
%A Ronald Taylor
%D 1979
%C London and New York
%I Paul Elek, Taplinger
%G ISBN 0 8008 4792 X
%X With bibliography.

%T Wagner
%A Walter James Redfern Turner
%D 1979
%C Westport, Conn.
%I Greenwood Press
%X
%O Originally published by Duckworth in 1933, London.

%T Richard Wagner as he Lived
%A William Wallace
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C
%I Best Books
%G ISBN 0 7222 5602 7 hbk
%X
%O Originally published in 1925 by Kegan Paul and Co., London.

%T Richard Wagner : A Biography
%A Derek Watson
%D 1979, 1981, 1983
%C London, New York
%I J. M. Dent & Co., Schirmer, McGraw-Hill
%G ISBN 0 4600 3166 X hbk, ISBN 0 0287 2700 2 hbk, ISBN 0 0706 8479 0 pbk
%X With bibliography.

%T Wagner : A Biography
%T Wagner
%M German
%A Curt von Westernhagen
%F Mary Whittall
%D 1978
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 5212 8254 3
%V 2 volumes
%X A conservative biography from a noted German scholar, who in the 1930s
had published a study of Wagner entitled, 'Richard Wagners Kampf gegen
seelische Fremdherrschaft' (Richard Wagner's Struggle against Spiritual
Foreign Domination). Even in 1968, Westernhagen still played down both
Wagner's revolutionary involvement in 1848-9, and referred to Wagner's
'alleged' anti-Semitism. Michael Tanner writes: "a work of piety by an
old Wagnerian, selectively making use of modern research".
%O Originally published in 1968.

%T An introduction to the Life and Works of Richard Wagner
%A Chappell White
%D 1967
%C Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
%I Prentice-Hall
%X

------------------------------

Subject: C. Biographies of Cosima Wagner

%T Cosima la sublime
%M French
%A Francoise Giroud
%D 1996
%C Paris
%I Fayard, Pocket
%G ISBN 2 2135 9532 1 hbk, ISBN 2 2660 7863 1 pbk
%X

%T Cosima Wagner
%T Cosima Wagner : Ein Lebens- und Charakterbild
%M German
%A Richard Graf Du Moulin-Eckart
%F Catherine Alison Phillips
%D 1995 (reprint)
%C Munich
%I Da Capo Press Inc
%V 2 volumes
%X The authorised biography of Cosima Wagner. With an introduction by
Ernest Newman. Introduction to the Da Capo edition by George Buelow.
Martin van Amerongen observes that Du Moulin-Eckart "must have written
his book lying flat on his stomach, so cringingly obsequious is its
tone".
%O Originally published 1929-31.

%T Cosima Wagner
%A George R. Marek
%D 1981-1983
%C New York and London
%I Harper and Row, Julia MacRae Books
%G ISBN 0 0601 2704 X, ISBN 0 8620 3120 6
%X

%T Richard and Cosima Wagner : Biography of a Marriage
%A Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1982
%C London and New York
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd, Houghton Miffin Co.
%G ISBN 0 575 03017 8, ISBN 0 3953 1836 X
%X

%T Cosima Wagner : a Biography (UK title)
%T Cosima Wagner : Extraordinary Daughter of Franz Liszt (US title)
%A Alice Hunt Sokoloff
%D 1969, 1970
%C London and New York
%I Macdonald and Co.
%G ISBN 0 3560 2939 5
%X

------------------------------
Subject: D. Other Biographical Studies

%T Wagner, a Case History
%T De buikspreker van God
%M Dutch
%A Martin van Amerongen
%F Stewart Spencer
%F Dominic Cakebread
%D 1983 and 1984
%C London and New York
%I J. M. Dent and Sons Ltd., G. Braziller
%G ISBN 0 4600 4618 7
%X An amusing and irreverent examination first of Richard Wagner's
life and works, and secondly of how his descendants have treated his
artistic legacy. With a short but interesting bibliography and a
brief discography.
%O Dutch original published in 1983 by Uitgeverij De Arbeiderspers,
Amsterdam.

%T Wagner : A Documentary Study
%T Wagner : sein Leben und seine Welt in zeitgenossischen Bildern und
Texten
%A Herbert Barth
%A Dietrich Mack (ed)
%A Egon Voss (ed)
%F Peter Robert John Ford
%F Mary Whittall
%D 1975
%C London
%I Thames and Hudson
%G ISBN 0 5002 7399 5
%X Preface by Pierre Boulez.

%T Wagner in Exile : 1849-62
%T Richard Wagners Verbannung und Ruckkehr 1849-1862
%M German
%A Woldemar Lippert
%F Paul England
%D 1930
%C London
%I G. G. Harrap & Co.
%X Original version was published in 1927.

------------------------------
Subject: E. Wagner and his Circle

%T Wagner and Nietzsche
%T Wagner und Nietzsche : der Mystagoge und sein Abtrünniger
%M German
%A Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
%F Joachim Neugroschel
%D 1976-1978
%C New York and London
%I Seabury Press
%G ISBN 0 8164 9280 8
%X Like Robert Gutman, Fischer-Dieskau gives too much credence to the
"official" version of the breach between Wagner and Nietzsche. Cosima's
Diaries and other evidence provides abundant grounds to doubt the story
of the final conversation between Wagner and Nietzsche, which according
to the "official" version took place at Sorrento on 2 November 1876. In
fact this story is entirely the invention of Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche.
%O Originally published in 1974, Stuttgart.

%T Wagner at Home
%T Le collier des jours : le troisième rang du collier
%T Visites à Richard Wagner
%M French
%A Judith Gautier
%F Effie Dunreith Massie
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C Best Books
%I ISBN 0 7222 5572 1 hbk
%X Memoirs of Judith Gautier (1845-1917), a French author (member of the
the Academie Goncourt and of the Legion d'Honneur) with whom Wagner
became infatuated during the 1870s. She kept him supplied with fabrics,
perfumes and intimate letters (which he destroyed) during the
composition of 'Parsifal'. Judith translated the libretto into French.
%O French original published in 1909,
revised edition 1943. Translation originally published in 1910-11 by
Mills and Boon Ltd (London) and John Lane Inc. (New York). See below
for a biography of Judith Gautier.

%T Nietzsche and Wagner : A Lesson in Subjugation
%A Joachim Köhler
%F Ronald Taylor
%D 1998
%C New Haven and London
%I Yale University Press
%G ISBN 0 3000 7640 1
%X Laon writes: "I am sorry to say that this book has the scholarly merit
of a UFO abduction memoir. Köhler asserts that Nietzsche was homosexual,
a claim for which he adduces no evidence at all. But we have plenty of
evidence of Nietzsche's heterosexuality and no evidence at all of
same-sex desire or practice. Nietzsche was a misogynist, hostile and
contemptuous towards women, also clearly afraid of them, but that
doesn't make him homosexual. Köhler seems to think that claiming
something is the same as making it so. He also claims that after the
Nietzsche-Wagner split Wagner conducted a relentless and vindictive
campaign against Nietzsche on the grounds that he was homosexual. Again,
Köhler doesn't support this claim of a homophobic campaign by Wagner with
any evidence. But then, how could he? There was no such campaign. It is
clear from Cosima Wagner's Diaries that Wagner's private reaction to the
split with Nietzsche was regret, a wish to have the breach healed, and
an undoubtedly patronising pity for 'that poor young man' Nietzsche.
These are not the sort of feelings that lead to persecution or a
campaign of vilification, as Köhler claims. Wagner's actual attitude to
homosexuals is suggested in an earlier letter to a homosexual friend.
Wagner suggests that his friend 'try to cut down a little, on the
pederasty'. The attitude is one of amused tolerance, which won't do now,
but it was progressive and liberal by the standards of his time. Wagner
was not a homophobe. Wagner did not respond in public to Nietzsche's
repeated attacks (except once, a very indirect reference in one of his
essays, without mentioning Nietzsche's name); contra Köhler, the abuse
was very much a one-way street, and not in the direction that Köhler
suggests. Köhler also presents a Nietzsche who wrote anti-Semitic
passages in his works during the alliance with Wagner, but who stopped
after the split. This is simply and flagrantly untrue. The post-Wagner
Nietzsche attacked anti-Semites, but he also continued to attack and
insult Jews."

%T Personal Recollections of Wagner
%T Erinnerungen an Richard Wagner
%M German
%A Angelo Neumann
%F Edith Livermore
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C
%I Best Books
%G ISBN 0 7222 5592 6
%X Neumann was a singer, producer and impresario who, while director
of the Leipzig opera, obtained permission from Wagner to stage the
'Ring' there. He proposed to establish a Wagner theatre in Berlin,
although sufficient funding was never raised for this project. In
1882 with Wagner's permission, Neumann produced a staging of the 'Ring'
suitable for touring, which he staged all over Europe. Like many of
Wagner's most enthusiastic supporters, remarkably, Neumann was Jewish.
%O German original published in 1907, Leipzig. English translation
first published in 1909 by Archibald Constable and Co., London.

%T Wagner as I Knew Him
%A Ferdinand C.W. Praeger
%D 2001, 2003 (reprints)
%C
%I University Press of the Pacific, Best Books
%G ISBN 1 4102 0771 4 pbk, ISBN 0 7222 5598 5 hbk
%X According to Sir W.H. Hadow this book "was received with great alarm
and indignation by the Wagnerians, partly because it fell short of
unthinking hero-worship, partly because it gave a full and indiscreet
account of the Dresden revolution, Wagner's part in which it was a
matter of religion to ignore or minimize. The German version of the
book was suppressed at the instance of H.S. Chamberlain ... I have read
many books on Wagner -- I began to write about him forty years ago --
and have come to the conclusion that among contemporary biographies
Praeger gives the truest picture."
%O Originally published in 1885 by Longmans, Green and Co., London.

%T Judith Gautier : A Biography
%A Joanna Richardson
%D 1986, 1987
%C London and New York
%I Quartet books, Franklin Watts Inc., Interlink Publishing
%G ISBN 0 7043 2483 0, ISBN 0 5311 5025 9 hbk, ISBN 0 7043 0085 0 pbk
%X Judith Gautier was Wagner's muse during the composition of 'Parsifal'.

------------------------------
Subject: F. Wagner and his Contemporaries

%T Mozart, Weber, and Wagner : With Various Essays on Musical Subjects
%M French
%A Hector Berlioz
%F Edwin Evans
%D 1986, 1999 (reprints)
%C New York
%I Somerset, Reprint Services Corp.
%G ISBN 0 7812 0566 2
%X
%O Originally published in translation in 1918 (London, W. Reeves)

%T Aus Eduard Hanslicks Wagner-Kritiken
%M German
%A Eduard Hanslick
%A Heinrich Kralik (ed)
%D 1947
%C Vienna and New York
%I Europa Verlag
%X

%T Eduard Hanslick's Music Criticisms
%M German
%A Eduard Hanslick
%F
%D 1988
%C New York
%I Dover Publications
%G ISBN 0 4862 5739 8
%X

%T Richard Wagner's Visit To Rossini And An Evening At Rossini's In Beau-Sejour
%M French
%A Edmond Michotte
%F Herbert Weinstock
%D 1992
%C London
%I Quartet Books
%X Two short memoirs by a friend of Rossini, first published in 1906 and 1893.
%O

%T Wagner Remembered
%A Stewart Spencer
%D 2000
%C London
%I Faber and Faber Ltd
%G ISBN 0 571 19653 5
%X Richard Wagner as portrayed in the memoirs and diaries of relatives,
friends and fellow musicians. Including Queen Victoria, King Ludwig and
Giacomo Meyerbeer.

------------------------------

Subject: III. General Titles about Richard Wagner

These are general books about Wagner, his ideas and his influence, that
do not fall into the categories above.

%T The Ideas of Richard Wagner : An Examination and Analysis
%A Alan Aberbach
%D 2003 (second edition)
%C Lanham and Oxford
%I University Press of America
%G ISBN 0 7618 2524 X
%X As its sub-title indicates, this book examines and analyses the wide
range of ideas that Wagner absorbed, developed and in many cases made
his own. The author presents these ideas largely in Wagner's own words,
as expressed in his prose works and letters. The book might be
considered a biographical supplement, since it traces the development
of Wagner's thoughts from optimistic youth through pessimistic middle-
age to irascible old-age. The book contains three sections, entitled
respectively: 'The Political Stage', 'The Spiritual and Religious
Stage' and 'The Artistic Stage'. With bibliography.
%O First edition published 1988.

%T In Search of Wagner
%T Versuch über Wagner
%M German
%A Theodor Adorno
%F Rodney Livingstone
%D 1981
%C London
%I Verso Books
%G ISBN 0 8609 1796 7
%X A Marxist viewpoint on Wagner and his works. As far as the editor has
been able to establish, Adorno was the first writer to suggest that
Beckmesser and Klingsor might be Jewish caricatures. Michael Tanner
writes: "important because of its author, showing how a thinker of
genius can be led by reacting to Wagner's art into wild postures of
rejection, and sneaking admiration".
%O German original was published in 1952. Translation was last reprinted
in 1991.

%T Darwin, Marx, Wagner : Critique of a Heritage
%A Jacques Barzun
%D 1981
%C Chicago
%I Univ. of Chicago Press
%X Among the subjects discussed in the book are Wagner's relationships
with Berlioz, Liszt and Nietzsche, and his influence on literature and
artistic life in Germany and England respectively.
%O Originally published in 1958 by Doubleday and Co.

%T The Wagner Companion
%A Peter Burbidge (ed)
%A Richard Sutton (ed)
%D 1979
%C London, New York
%I Faber; Cambridge Univ. Press
%G ISBN 0 571 10471 1
%X J.K. Holman writes, "This is a collection of essays covering Wagner's
life and work, arranged by subject and covering a wide range of
significant issues. The chapters on the German intellectual and
literary background, rarely explored in English, are particularly
useful. The gem is Deryck Cooke on Wagner's development of
revolutionary harmonic techniques to articulate a coherent musical
language."
%O Cooke's analysis of the musical motives of the 'Ring' has been
reissued on a CD set, Decca/London 443 581-2.

%T Wagner and the Reform of the Opera
%A Edward Dannreuther
%D 1904
%C London
%I Augener and Co.
%X

%T Richard Wagner : his Tendencies and Theories
%A Edward Dannreuther
%D 1873
%C London
%I Augener and Co.
%X

%T Wagner Werk-Verzeichnis : Verzeichnis der musikalischen Werke Richard
Wagners und ihrer Quellen : Erarbeitet im Rahmen der Richard Wagner-
Gesamtausgabe
%M German
%A John Deathridge (ed)
%A Martin Geck
%A Egon Voss
%A Isolde Vetter (ass.ed)
%D 1986
%C Mainz
%I Schott
%G ISBN 3 7957 2201 2
%X The (almost) complete catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic
works, including sketches, unfinished and lost works, and even some
works for which text, but no music, was written. For each of the works
included, the catalogue lists its title, subtitle, genre and, where
appropriate, an indication of key and the musical forces for which it
was written. For the stage works, it gives the locations of the action
and role lists as they appear in printed editions. Musical incipits are
given for each work for which any music has survived. Manuscripts are
listed both for text (sketches, prose drafts and poems) and for music
(drafts, complete drafts and facsimiles). Early printed editions of the
full text and of scores (full, vocal and extracts) are listed for each
of the published works.

%T The Fertilizing Seed : Wagner's Concept of Poetic Intent
%A Frank W. Glass
%D 1982
%C Ann Arbor MI
%I
%X Glass discusses Wagner's theories as presented in his most extensive
treatise 'Oper und Drama' and examines how his ideas developed
subsequently. The majority of writers about Wagner's theory and practise
have concluded that his ideas underwent a reversal between 1851 and
1870. Glass prefers to see this as a change of emphasis. He argues that
Wagner consistently held on to one idea: that the "poetic intent"
stimulates a musical response and calls it forth as drama. Glass calls
this the fundamental idea of 'Oper und Drama' and finds it still
present, although with a different emphasis, in the later theoretical
writings.

%T Wagner's Musical Prose
%A Thomas S. Grey
%D 1995
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 5214 1738 4
%S New Perspectives in Music History and Criticism
%X A study of the prose writings of Richard Wagner and their relevance to
an understanding of his music and drama, as well as their relation to music
criticism and aesthetics in the 19th century in general. Grey considers
Wagner's ambivalence concerning the idea of absolute music and the capacity
of music to project meaning or drama; Wagner's appropriation of a Beethoven
legacy, the metaphors of musical gender and biology in 'Opera and Drama',
and the critical background to ideas of motive and leitmotif in theory and
practice.

%T Re-reading Wagner
%A Reinhold Grimm (ed)
%A Jost Hermand (ed)
%D 1993
%C
%I Univ of Wisconsin Press
%G ISBN 0 2999 7076 0
%X A collection of diverse essays about Wagner and his influence.

%T Richard Wagner and the Music of the Future : History and Aesthetics
%A Franz Hueffer
%D 1971 (reprint)
%C Freeport, NY
%I Books for Libraries Press
%G ISBN 0 8369 2508 4
%S The Great Musicians
%X
%O Originally published in 1874.

%T The Truth about Wagner
%A Philip Dutton Hurn
%A Waverley Lewis Root
%D 1930
%C New York
%I Frederick A. Stokes Company
%X In part based on documents in the Burrell Collection.

%T Musica Ficta : Figures of Wagner
%M French
%A Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
%F Felicia McCarren
%D 1994
%C Stanford
%I Stanford Univ. Press
%G ISBN 0 8047 2385 0 hbk, ISBN 0 8047 2376 1 pbk
%X Surveys Wagner's influence on music and aesthetics in the 20th century.
%O French original was published in 1991.

%T Richard Wagner : The Terrible Man and His Truthful Art: The 1998
Larkin-Stuart Lectures
%A M. Owen Lee
%D 1999
%C Toronto and New York
%I University of Toronto Press
%G ISBN 0 8020 4721 1
%X Discusses various aspects of Wagner and his influence.

%T Richard Wagner, Fritz Lang, and the Nibelungen: The Dramaturgy of
Disavowal
%A David J. Levin
%D 1999
%C Princeton
%I Princeton Univ Press
%G ISBN 0 6910 4971 8
%X Levin explores the uses that have been made of the Nibelung legend in
shaping German national and cultural identity. He seeks and finds anti-
Semitic messages both in Wagner's "Ring" and in Lang's "Nibelungen"; but
makes no mention of the inconvenient fact that Lang was of Jewish descent
or that he fled Germany when his work was banned by the Nazis.

%T Who's Who and What's What in Wagner
%A Jonathan Lewsey
%D 1997
%C Brookfield VT
%I Ashgate Publishing Company, Scolar Press
%G ISBN 1 8592 8280 6 hbk, ISBN 1 8592 8285 7 pbk
%X

%T Aspects of Wagner
%A Bryan Magee
%D 1988 (revised edition)
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 1928 4012 6
%X Laon writes: "This is not a comprehensive overview of Wagner's life,
work and thought, but a collection of essays on different Wagner topics.
Magee is interesting on the notoriously strong emotional response --
positive or negative -- people have to the music, and offers some
thoughts on why this is so. The essay, 'Jews, not least in music' puts
Wagner's infamous essay 'Das Judentum in der Musik' into perspective, as
considerably less inflammatory than many people, who have perhaps only
heard the title, believe. It is also interesting on Wagner's influence
in literature, poetry, painting, and so on. A short book, just over 100
pages, written in absolutely plain English. It's an odd thing about a
man whose works are famous for their length, but the shorter books about
Wagner tend to be the best."
%O First edition published in 1968.

%T Pro and Contra Wagner
%T Wagner und unsere Zeit
%M German
%A Thomas Mann
%F Allan Blunden
%D 1985
%C London and Chicago
%I Faber
%G ISBN 0 571 13150 6 hbk, ISBN 0 5711 3636 2 pbk
%X Includes Mann's 1933 lecture, "The Sorrows and Grandeur of Richard
Wagner".
%O With an introduction by Erich Heller and a preface by Patrick
Carnegy.

%T The Wagner Compendium : A Guide to Wagner's Life and Music
%A Barry Millington (ed)
%D 1992
%C London
%I Thames and Hudson, Macmillan
%G ISBN 0 0287 1359 1
%X Includes a detailed list of Wagner's writings and a general
bibliography. Millington takes the opportunity to ride his favourite
hobby-horses. Other contributors are Stewart Spencer, Thomas Grey, David
Large, Konrad Bund, Roger Hollinrake, Warren Darcy, Raymond Furness,
David Breckbill, William Weber, Hugh Lloyd-Jones, Joachim Thierry,
Ulrich Tröhler, Arnold Whittall, Michael Hall, and Christopher Wintle.

%T Wagner Handbook
%T Wagner Handbuch
%M German
%A Ulrich Müller
%A Peter Wapnewski
%F John Deathridge (ed)
%D 1992
%C Cambridge MA
%I Harvard University Press
%G ISBN 0 6749 4530 1
%X An extensive collection of essays on Richard Wagner's career,
cultural relationships, and psychology. In addition to essays and
reference material provided by Müller, Wapnewski and Deathridge, the
Handbook contains contributed essays by Carl Dahlhaus, Isolde Vetter,
Rüdiger Krohn, Dieter Borchmeyer, Ernst Hanisch, Volker Mertens, Peter
Branscombe, Hartmut Reinhart, Manfred Eger, Erwin Koppen, Günter Metkin,
Werner Breig, Oswald Bauer, Jens Malte Fischer, and Jürgen Kühnel.
Michael Tanner writes: "Whether you want to know about Wagner in
Literature and Film, Wagner's Middle Ages, the Operas as Literary Works,
or to consult a large bibliography, or read on any of the central areas
of 'Wagner research', you will find at least one substantial chapter
here".

%T Wagner and His Operas
%A Stanley Sadie
%D 1999 and 2000
%C London
%I St Martins Press, Macmillan
%S New Grove Composers
%G ISBN 0 3122 4432 0 hbk, ISBN 0 3337 9021 9 pbk
%X Contributed articles by among others Arnold Whittall and Barry
Millington. Material recycled from the New Grove Dictionary of Opera.

%T Richard Wagner and the Synthesis of the Arts
%A Jack M. Stein
%D 1973
%C Detroit
%I Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc.
%G ISBN 0 8371 6806 6
%X Professor Stein considers the development of Wagner's ideas about the
synthesis of poetry, music, dance and drama from the writings of his
Paris years through to the 'Beethoven' essay of 1870 and the lecture 'On
the Destiny of Opera' in 1871. Stein examines how the stage-works from
'Rienzi' to 'Parsifal' reflect the development of Wagner's theoretical
ideas.
%O Originally published in 1960.

%T A Richard Wagner Dictionary
%A Edward M. Terry
%D 1939
%C New York
%I H.W. Wilson
%X This is a quick alphabetical reference guide to places and people in
Wagner's life, titles of his prose works (keyed to the Ellis' translation),
synopses of the operas, and biographies of the operas' characters . With
musical examples.
%O

%T Interpreting Wagner
%A James Treadwell
%D 2003
%C New Haven and London
%I Yale University Press
%G ISBN 0 300 09815 4
%X It is not entirely clear why this book was written, except that the
author obviously wanted to write it. He declares at the outset that it
was not intended as an interpretation of Wagner, nor as a guide to how
Wagner ought to be interpreted. On page 133 he confides, "this is not a
book about what Wagner's work means but *how* it means"; by which he
might mean, how those works work. Much of what Treadwell writes (and he
writes well) is insightful and thought-provoking. He finds an
appropriate balance of discussion between concepts, words and (without
being too technical) music; and care has been taken with translations.
On the other hand, too much of the book is derivative, repeating
analysis to be found in earlier books listed in this bibliography. Some
might find this book too much influenced by Adorno, or too conventional,
or question some of Treadwell's judgements (for example, that 'Tristan'
is formless). The text is sometimes inaccurate (e.g. his unqualified
assertion that the 'Parsifal' material was mentioned several times by
Wagner in 1856) or misleading (e.g. when he refers to Parsifal as a
"holy fool"), and the reflective reader will not agree with all of the
author's sweeping generalizations. The best part is a concise analysis
of 'Meistersinger'; the weakest parts are those in which the author
reveals a limited grasp of Wagner's ideas about religion.

------------------------------

Subject: IV. Books about Wagner's Works

Each of these titles is devoted either to a specific work, or to a set
of works, by Richard Wagner.

------------------------------

Subject: A. Der fliegende Holländer

WWV 63 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 4 (ed. Isolde Vetter)
of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the development and
initial reception of the work are to be published in volume 24.

%T Richard Wagner : 'Der fliegende Holländer'
%A Thomas S. Grey (ed)
%D 2000
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge Univ Press
%G ISBN 0 5215 8285 7
%S Cambridge Opera Handbooks
%X Contributors include Barry Millington on the sources and genesis of
the libretto, Patrick Carnegy and David Breckbill on the history of the
work in performance, and Stephen McClatchie on the belated arrival of
the Dutchman in Bayreuth. Appendices include: a translation by Stewart
Spencer of the relevant part of Heine's short story; a translation by
Peter Bloom of Wagner's original (French) scenario; Spencer's
translation of the surviving fragment of the (German) Prose Draft; and
selected passages from Wagner's prose writings and correspondence
concerning the work.

------------------------------

Subject: B. Tannhäuser

WWV 70 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 5 (stages 1 and 2, ed.
Reinhard Strohm) and volume 6 (stages 3 and 4, ed. Peter Jost) of the
'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the development and initial
reception of the work are to be published in volume 25. Wagner's own
piano and vocal arrangements of the various stages of the score are
included in volume 20.

%T Wagner's Tannhäuser and its Literary Sources
%A Mary A. Cicora
%D 1992
%C Frankfurt a.M. and New York
%I Peter Lang
%G ISBN 3 2610 4408 X
%S Germanic Studies in America
%V 63
%X Cicora discusses Wagner's usage of Tieck, Hoffmann, Heine, Lucas,
Bechstein and of medieval sources concerning Tanhusære or Danheüser, the
legend of the Venusberg, Heinrich von Ofterdingen and the song contest
on the Wartburg.
%O There is a considerable literature concerning the Tannhäuser legend,
apart from the use Wagner made of it. See for example Dietz-Rüdiger
Moser, 'Die Tannhäuser-Legende: Eine Studie über Intentionalität und
Rezeption katechistischer Volkerzählungen zum Buss-Sakrament', Berlin
and NY, 1977.

%T 'Tannhäuser' : An Examination of Thirty-Six Editions
%A Cecil Hopkinson
%D 1973
%C Tutzing
%I Schneider
%G ISBN 3 7952 0122 5
%X

------------------------------

Subject: C. Lohengrin

WWV 75 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 7 (ed. John Deathridge
and Klaus Döge) of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the
development and initial reception of the work are to be published in
volume 26.

These books about Wagner's swan knight are probably of more interest for
their illustrations than for their texts.

%T 'Lohengrin' : The Story of Wagner's Opera
%A Alan Blyth
%A Maria A. Gambaro (illustrator)
%D 1981-82
%C London and New York
%I Julia MacRae Books, Franklin Watts
%G ISBN 0 8620 3068 4 hbk
%X The story of Wagner's opera retold, with full page colour illustrations.
%O

%T Parsifal, Lohengrin and the Legend of the Holy Grail Described and
Interpreted in Accordance with Wagner's Own Writings
%A Alice Leighton Cleather and Basil Crump
%D 1904
%C London
%I Methuen & Co.
%X
%O

%T 'Lohengrin' : The Story of Wagner's Opera
%A Robert Lawrence
%A Alexander Serebriakoff (illustrator)
%D 1938
%C New York
%I Silver, Burdett and Co., Grosset and Dunlap
%X Originally put out by the Metropolitan Opera Guild in a series
intended to acquaint children with opera.
%O

%T Tale of Lohengrin, Knight of the Swan after the Drama of Richard Wagner
%A T.W. Rolleston
%A Willy Pogàny (illustrator)
%D 1913
%C London
%I G.G. Harrap & Co.
%X Similar books were produced on the subjects of 'Tannhäuser' and
'Parsifal' respectively. The Hungarian-born Pogàny (1882-1955) studied in
Budapest, Munich and Paris, then migrated first to London, where he designed
these volumes; one year later (1914), he went on to America, where he
achieved renown for the design of stage sets for the Metropolitan Opera and
for Broadway productions, for institutional and theatrical murals, for
architectural design, for Hollywood art direction and for his book design
and illustration.
%O

%T The Story of Wagner's 'Lohengrin'
%A Frederick Colin Tilney (text and illustrations)
%D 1911?
%C London
%I George Routledge & Sons, Ltd.
%X With six colour illustrations.
%O

------------------------------

Subject: D. Der Ring des Nibelungen

WWV 86 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volumes 10-13 (ed. Egon Voss
and Hartmut Fladt) of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the
development and initial reception of the work published in volume 29
(ed. Werner Breig and Hartmut Fladt).

%T A Guide to The Ring of the Nibelung: The Trilogy of Richard Wagner :
Its Origin, Story, and Music
%A Richard Aldrich
%D 1905
%C Boston MA
%I Oliver Ditson Company
%X
%O

%T A Ring for the Millennium : A Guide to Wagner's 'Der Ring des
Nibelungen'
%A Peter Bassett
%D 1998
%C Kent Town, South Australia
%I Wakefield Press
%G ISBN 1 8625 4471 9
%X Issued in conjunction with the first 'Ring' production in Adelaide.
%O

%T Ring of Power : The Abandoned Child, the Authoritarian Father, and
the Disempowered Feminine
%A Jean Shiboda Bolen
%D 1992
%C San Francisco
%I HarperCollins
%G ISBN 0 0625 0086 4 pbk
%X A Jungian understanding of Wagner's 'Ring' cycle. Bolen uses the
characters and situations of the 'Ring' as a starting point to discuss
Jungian ideas, without casting much light on the 'Ring' in the process.
%O

%T Women Characters in Richard Wagner: A Study in the Ring of the Nibelung
%A Louise Brink
%D 2001
%C
%I Best Books
%G ISBN 0 7222 5563 2
%X
%O

%T Richard Wagner: The Nibelung's Ring: An Act by Act Guide to the Plot and
Music
%A Aylmer Buesst
%D 1952
%C London
%I Newman Neame
%X
%O Originally published in 1932 by Bell, London.

%T Mythology as Metaphor : Romantic Irony, Critical Theory, and Wagner's Ring
%A Mary A. Cicora
%D 1998
%C Westport, CT
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 3133 0528 5
%X An original interpretation of the Ring tetralogy that
challenges the standard political analyses of the work.
%O

%T Wagner's 'Ring' and German Drama
%A Mary A. Cicora
%D 1999
%C Westport, CT
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 3133 0529 3
%X The relationships of the Ring to the German literary and dramatic
tradition, from Goethe and Schiller to von Hofmannsthal.
%O

%T The Ring of the Nibelung : An Interpretation Embodying Wagner's Own
Explanations
%A Alice Leighton Cleather and Basil Crump
%D 1924 (second edition)
%C London
%I Methuen & Co.
%X
%O Originally published in 1904.

%T I Saw the World End : A Study of Wagner's 'Ring'
%A Deryck Cooke
%A Jacqueline Cooke (ed)
%D 1979
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 19 315318 1
%X Sadly, Deryck Cooke died without completing this fascinating study, which
is widely considered to be essential reading for anyone interested in the
'Ring' cycle. J.K. Holman writes: "Cooke intended to refute the Jungian
Robert Donington and other 'Ring' analyses that Cooke considered
nonobjective. 'After all', he wrote, 'the question is not, "What
meaning can we find in 'The Ring'?", but "What did Wagner really mean by
'The Ring'? Cooke believed that 'the overt meaning of each element in
the drama must be accepted as what it is (and what Wagner intended it to
be), and not explained away or made to mean something else.'"
%O Cooke's analysis of the musical motives of the 'Ring' has been
reissued on a CD set, Decca/London 443 581-2.

%T A Memoir of Bayreuth 1876 related by Carl Emil Doeppler
%A Peter Cook
%D 1979
%C London
%G ISBN 0 9504360 1 1
%X Including colour illustrations of his costume designs for the first
production of the 'Ring'.
%O

%T An Introduction to Richard Wagner's 'Der Ring des Nibelungen' :
A Handbook
%A William O. Cord
%D 1995
%C Athens OH
%I Ohio University Press
%G ISBN 0 8214 1112 8
%X An overview of the mythology, of the history of Bayreuth, a list of
related characters in mythology, a bibliography, a discography,
biographies of the 1876 cast, a diagram of the relationships between the
characters and more.

%T The Teutonic Mythology of Richard Wagner's 'The Ring of the Nibelung'
%A William O. Cord
%D 1989
%C New York, Queenstown Ontario and Lampeter Wales
%I Edwin Mellen Press
%G ISBN 0 8894 6443 X
%V 5 volumes.
%X An examination of the Nordic and Germanic sources of the 'Ring'. In a
review of this book Elizabeth Magee drew attention to a number of factual
errors.

%T Wagner and the New Consciousness : Language and Love in the 'Ring'
%A Sandra Corse
%D 1990
%C Cranbury, NJ
%I Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press
%G ISBN 0 8386 3378 1
%X Sandra Corse's book is fascinating but also frustrating. Fascinating
because Dr. Corse sets out to explore the influence of the ideas of
Hegel and Feuerbach on Wagner before and during the creation of the
'Ring'. If anyone doubts that these thinkers provided key ingredients of
the mix from which the tetralogy was baked, then little doubt will
remain after reading this book. Frustrating because Dr. Corse does not
deliver everything that she promises. Although she relates Wagner's
thinking to key ideas in books that he is known to have read (or at
least tackled), it is not entirely clear that she understands either the
originals or Wagner's understanding of them. This does not mean that we
should reject her ideas, e.g. concerning Wagner's creative reworking of
Hegel's phenomenology. The book might have been better without the
digressions into Marxist theories about language and society, which the
author apparently thinks relevant because Marx, even more so than
Wagner, was influenced by Feuerbach and Hegel. Finally it is a little
disturbing that an English teacher makes so many grammatical mistakes
and that she persistently spells the name of a noted Wagner scholar as
"Dalhouse" !

%T Ring Resounding : the Recording in Stereo of 'Der Ring des
Nibelungen'
%A John Culshaw
%D 1967
%C London
%I Secker and Warburg
%X J.K. Holman writes: "A good behind-the-scenes account of an artistic
collaboration, this book documents with wit and charm the successes and
trials of the immense effort. Moreover, by showing us how musical
problems were faced and solved, Culshaw sheds much light on the meaning
of 'The Ring' itself."

%T Reflections on Wagner's 'Ring'
%A John Culshaw
%A Frank Dunand (photographs)
%D 1976
%C New York and London
%I Viking Press, Secker and Warburg
%X The first four chapters are based on a series of intermission
features on the Texaco Met Opera radio broadcasts of the 'Ring' during
the 1974-5 season. The last chapter is expanded from an article that
appeared in 'Opera News'. With bibliography.

%T Wagner's 'Das Rheingold'
%A Warren Darcy
%D 1993, 1996
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press, Clarendon Press
%G ISBN 0 1981 6603 6 hbk, ISBN 0 1981 6603 6 pbk
%S Studies in Musical Genesis and Structure
%X A musical analysis of 'Das Rheingold', drawing on Lorenz and Schenker.

%T The Musical Design of the Ring
%A A.E.F. Dickinson
%D 1926
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%X
%O Paperback

%T Penetrating Wagner's 'Ring' : An Anthology
%A John Louis DiGaetani (ed)
%D 1991
%C Cranbury NJ and London
%I Da Capo Press
%G ISBN 0 306 80437 9 pbk
%X J.K. Holman writes: "A compendium of short pieces on a broad range of
'Ring' topics by many of its most gifted analysts and performers, such
as Georg Solti, Adolpha Appia, Wieland Wagner, Culshaw, Donington,
Porter, and G.B. Shaw."
%O Originally published in 1978, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ. Press.

%T Wagner's 'Ring' and its Symbols : The Music and the Myth
%A Robert Donington
%D 1963
%C London
%I Faber and Faber Ltd
%G ISBN 0 571 04818 8
%X Laon writes: "Jungian analysis can be interesting when it is applied
to myth. It is, after all, largely based on Jung's ideas about myth,
which makes Jungian ideas fairly apt for reading a myth-based work like
the 'Ring'. Robert Donington is a Jungian true believer, who applies
Jung's ideas with considerable ingenuity and interest. Sometimes he will
do anything to fit Wagner into the Jungian framework. For example, he
reads the very male dragon Fafner as 'the mother in her devouring
aspect'. That is a pretty desperate reading: Fafner is nobody's female
principle, and only someone with a strongly pre-determined agenda could
try to make him one. Still, Donington is often insightful. Why is there
a brief reminiscence of Erda's theme when Fricka appears in Walküre Act
II? Because, says Donington, Fricka is somehow representing Erda's
wisdom in this appearance. Fricka may not seem wise but on this occasion
she is right. This and a hundred other small insights makes this a
worthwhile and constantly interesting book, which is also very good on
Wagner's mythological sources. Donington is right in thinking that the
Ring is an endlessly complex and profound work; but probably wrong in
thinking that Jung holds the key. While Donington's overall reading is
eccentric and not entirely reliable, this is a very enjoyable and often
an insightful book."

%T Wagner and Aeschylus : The 'Ring' and the 'Oresteia'
%A Michael Ewans
%D 1982
%C London
%I Faber and Faber
%G ISBN 0 571 11808 9
%X Wagner read Aeschylus' trilogy shortly before beginning work on his
'Ring'. In his autobiography Wagner wrote that his ideas about the
significance of drama and of the theatre had been moulded by his
response to this classical masterpiece. Ewans shows how it influenced
Wagner at many levels, from the basic idea of developing a festival
drama, as Aeschylus had done, using mythical materials, through to the
selection and treatment of the subject matter in the 'Ring'. Ewans
argues for a broad correspondence between the opening chorus of the
'Agamemnon' and Wagner's "preliminary evening", between the remainder of
that first play and 'Die Walküre', and between 'Choephori' and
'Siegfried'. Where the respective concluding dramas are concerned, the
contrasts between 'Eumenides' and 'Götterdämmerung' are at least as
significant as their affinities. In an appendix Ewans dismisses the
argument that 'Prometheus Bound' (previously attributed to Aeschylus,
possibly by Euphorion) was an influence on Wagner's 'Ring', despite the
obvious allusions in Wagner's text.

%T The Ring of the Nibelung
%A Burton D. Fisher
%D 2001
%C
%I Opera Journeys Publishing
%G ISBN 1 9308 4139 6 pbk
%S Opera Classics Library
%X With musical examples, discography, videography and dictionary of
musical and operatic terms. One of a large series of opera guides.
%O

%T Wagner in Rehearsal 1875-1876 : The Diaries of Richard Fricke
%T 1876, Richard Wagner auf der Probe : das Bayreuther Tagebuch
des Ballettmeisters und Hilfregisseurs Richard Fricke
%M German
%A Richard Fricke
%F George Fricke
%A James Andrew Deaville (ed)
%A Evan Baker (ass.)
%D 1998
%C
%I Pendragon Press
%G ISBN 0 9451 9386 6
%S Franz Liszt Studies Series
%V 7
%X Notes by one of the Wagner's production team.

%T Richard Wagner's 'Ring of the Nibelung' : An Illustrated Handbook
%A J.P. Jackson
%D 1882
%C
%I David Bogue
%X With six woodcut illustrations and musical examples.
%O

%T Wagner's 'Ring' : A Listener's Guide and Concordance
%A J.K. Holman
%D 1996
%C Portland OR
%I Amadeus Press
%G ISBN 1 5746 7014 X
%X Background, synopses, leading motives, characters, and a concordance
of 169 key words as they are used in the text of the cycle. With a
short but informative bibliography.

%T A Musical Guide to Richard Wagner's 'Ring of the Nibelung'
%A Ernest Hutcheson
%D recent (reprint)
%C
%I AMS Press, Inc.
%G ISBN 0 4040 3462 4
%X With booklet "Table of Themes".
%O Originally published in 1940 by Simon and Schuster, NY.

%T How to Understand Wagner's 'Ring of the Nibelung'
%A Gustav Kobbé
%D 1991 (reprint)
%C
%I Reprint Services Corporation
%G ISBN 0 7812 9341 3
%X
%O Originally published by William Reeves, London, in 1895.

%T Wagner's 'Ring of the Nibelung'
%A Robert Lawrence
%D 1939
%C New York
%I Grosset and Dunlap - Metropolitan Opera Guild
%V 4 vols.
%X
%O

%T Wagner's 'Ring' : Turning the Sky Round
%A M. Owen Lee
%D 1990
%C New York
%I Summit Books (distributed by Simon and Schuster Inc.)
%G ISBN 0 8791 0186 5
%X An edited transcript of 1990 radio intermission talks. Includes a
discography. J.K. Holman writes: "Lee views 'The Ring' as evolutionary,
both inwardly in terms of a soul in crisis and outwardly as the
prevailing religious cosmos gives way to a higher level of ethical
consciousness. This may be a doctrinal interpretation, but it is made
as elegantly and persuasively as any 'Ring' analysis."
%O Reprinted by Limelight Editions, 1994.

%T The Ethics of Wagner's 'The Ring of the Nibelung'
%A Mary Elizabeth Lewis
%D 2001
%C
%I Best Books
%G ISBN 0 7222 5588 8
%X
%O

%T Richard Wagner and the Nibelungs
%A Elizabeth Magee
%D 1990
%C Oxford and New York
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 19 816190 5
%X A comprehensive account of Wagner's reading and research during the
creation of his texts for the 'Ring', developed from the author's
doctoral thesis. In addition to the catalogue of Wagner's personal
library at Dresden, Magee studied the loan records of the Royal Library
there, to develop a chronology of Wagner's reading during the last
years before his exile. Anyone who has read Cooke's 'I Saw the World End'
and wants to know more about the background to the 'Ring' should obtain
this book.

%T Wagner's 'Siegfried' : Its Drama, History and Music
%A Patrick McCreless
%D 1982
%C Ann Arbor MI
%I UMI Research Press
%S Studies in Musicology
%V 59
%X A musical analysis of 'Siegfried', using Schenkerian techniques.

%T Wagner Rehearsing the 'Ring' : An Eye-Witness Account of the
Stage Rehearsals of the First Bayreuth Festival
%T Die Bühnenproben zu den Bayreuther Festspielen des Jahres 1876
%M German
%A Heinrich Porges
%F Robert L. Jacobs
%D 1983
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 521 23722 X
%X Notes taken in the Festspielhaus while Wagner directed his 'Ring'.
%O Originally published between 1881 and 1896.

%T Rackham's Color Illustrations for Wagner's 'Ring'
%A Arthur Rackham
%A James Spero (introduction and captions)
%D 1979
%C New York
%I Dover
%G ISBN 0 4862 3779 6
%X The 64 watercolour illustrations of scenes from the 'Ring' that were
first published, with an English translation of the poems, in 1911-12.
%O Originally published by Heinemann in London, and by Doubleday, Page
and Co. in New York.

%T The Dream of Self-Destruction : Wagner's 'Ring' and the Modern World
%A Lelland Joseph Rather
%D 1979
%C Baton Rouge and London
%I Louisiana University State Press
%X

%T New Studies in Richard Wagner's 'The Ring of the Nibelung'
%A Herbert Warren Richardson
%D 1991
%C Seattle WA
%I Edwin Mellen Press
%G ISBN 0 8894 6445 6
%X Papers presented at the 1988 Wagner conference in Seattle exploring
this cycle as music, myth, theatre art, and literature, including such
topics as dialectical materialism in the 'Ring', the psychological
development of Brünnhilde and the influence of Wagner's cycle on Eliot
and Hitler respectively.

%T The Perfect Wagnerite : A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring
%A George Bernard Shaw
%D 1967
%C New York
%I Dover Publications
%G ISBN 0 4862 1707 8 pbk
%X An idiosyncratic interpretation of the 'Ring'. J.K. Holman writes:
"Shaw's interpretation seems more misguided today than ever."
%O Originally published in 1898, reprinted 1923.

%T Redemption or Annihilation? : Love versus Power in Wagner's 'Ring'
%A John Tietz
%D 1999
%C New York
%I Peter Lang Publishing
%G ISBN 0 8204 4148 1
%X An interpretation is presented in which Nietzsche's criticisms form
the basis of a positive reading of 'The Ring'.

%T The Forging of the 'Ring'
%T Die Entstehung des 'Ring'
%M German
%A Curt von Westernhagen
%F Arnold Whittall
%A Mary Whittall (ed)
%D 1976
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%X The first systematic investigation of Wagner's sketches for the 'Ring'.
Von Westernhagen, taking each of the four dramas in turn, compares the
sketches with the finished score. He shows how far the original inspirations
were preserved, clarified or modified in the process of forging the 'Ring'.
%O Originally published in 1973.

%T The Turning Wheel : A Study of Contracts and Oaths in Wagner's 'Ring'
%A David A. White
%D 1988
%C Selinsgrove PA, London and Toronto
%I Susquehanna University Press, Associated University Presses
%G ISBN 0 9416 6489 9
%X For the legally minded.

%T Speaking to Our Condition : Moral Frameworks in Wagner's 'Ring of the
Nibelung'
%A Anthony Winterbourne
%D 2000
%C Cranbury, NJ
%I Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press
%G ISBN 0 8386 3847 3
%X

%T Guide through the Music of R. Wagner's 'The Ring of the Nibelung'
%M German
%A Baron Hans von Wolzogen
%F ?
%D 1882
%C Leipzig and London
%I Senf Brothers
%X Wolzogen is credited with inventing the term 'Leitmotiv' and his
analysis of Wagner's works is largely a guide to the Leitmotiven and
their evolution. Many of the names given to these 'musical calling
cards' by Wolzogen (such as 'Inheritance of the World' or 'Sea-motif')
have stuck, whether we like it or not.

------------------------------

Subject: E. Tristan und Isolde

WWV 90 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 8 (ed. Isolde Vetter)
of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the development and
initial reception of the work are to be published in volume 27.

Students of 'Tristan' who understand German will also benefit from reading
Lorenz's analysis of the score (1926) and Ernst Kurth's seminal study,
'Romantische Harmonik und ihre Krise in Wagner's Tristan' (1920).

%T Richard Wagner : Prelude and Transfiguration from 'Tristan und Isolde'
%A Robert Bailey
%D 1985
%C New York
%I
%S Norton Critical Scores
%G ISBN 0 3939 5405 6
%X For a "critical score" there are too many misprints in the music.
Some of the essays (from various commentators including Donald Tovey and
Alfred Lorenz) are valuable.

%T Wagner's 'Tristan und Isolde' : an Essay on the Wagnerian Drama
%A George Ainslie Hight
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C
%I Indypublish.com, Best Books
%G ISBN 1 4043 7915 0 pbk, ISBN 0 7222 5580 2 hbk
%X
%O Originally published in 1912 by S. Swift and Co. Ltd., London.

%T Wagner's Most Subtle Art : An Analytic Study of 'Tristan und Isolde'
%A Roger North
%D 1999
%C London
%I Roger North
%G ISBN 0 9527975 1 8
%X This 700-page study of Wagner's score is surely the most thorough
analysis ever attempted of any of Wagner's works. North shows that
behind the Leitmotiven that dominate the analyses of Wolzogen, Lorenz
and others, the musical material of 'Tristan' was developed from three
simple figures, all heard in the Prelude. In the first edition there
are many misprints in the musical examples; look for the second edition.
%O Originally published in 1996.
URL: < http://www.roger.north.btinternet.co.uk >

%T Guide to the Legend, Poem and Music of Richard Wagner's 'Tristan und
Isolde'
%T Richard Wagners Tristan und Isolde : ein Leitfaden durch Sage,
Dichtung und Musik
%M German
%A Baron Hans von Wolzogen
%F ?
%D 1884
%C Leipzig
%I Breitkopf and Härtel
%X One of Wolzogen's thematic guides. The book also provides an account
of the literary background to the work.
%O German original was published in 1880.

%T The First Hundred Years of Wagner's 'Tristan'
%A Elliot Zuckermann
%D 1964
%C New York and London
%I Columbia University Press
%G ISBN 0 2310 2699 4
%X Relates the genesis and subsequent history of 'Tristan und Isolde'
With three appendices: 1. Major premieres, 2. Swinburne and the Sea,
3. Joyce and Eliot. Michael Tanner writes: "The cataclysmic effect of
'Tristan' on musicians, poets, novelists etc. is dealt with in a
pioneering piece of intellectual history ... by the hostile Elliot
Zuckermann".

------------------------------

Subject: F. Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg

WWV 96 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 9 (ed. Egon Voss) of
the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the development and initial
reception of the work are to be published in volume 28.

%T The Sources and Text of Richard Wagner's Opera 'Die Meistersinger von
Nürnberg'
%A Anna Maude Bowen
%D 1897
%C Munich
%X This is A.M. Bowen's doctoral thesis (Cornell). Bowen examines
Wagner's use of his sources, including the technical details of the art
of the Mastersingers, i.e. the actual rules of the tablature; the tunes
described by David in act one; and the historical Mastersingers and
their music. In the process the author explains many of the obscurities
and subtleties of Wagner's poem. She also examines the origins of the
story in relation to works by a tale by Hoffmann, a drama by Deinhard-
stein and a comic opera by Lortzing based on the former; and Wagner's
quotations from and paraphrases of his main historical source,
Wagenseil. There is a short comparison of different versions of Wagner's
poem. Finally the author examines the language of the poem, in which she
variously identifies archaic words and forms, imitation of Hans Sachs'
poetry and hints of Bavarian dialect.
%O Reprinted 1977.

%T Wagner and 'Die Meistersinger'
%A Robert Macey Rayner
%D 1940
%C London
%I Oxford University Press
%X Rayner was one of the first commentators on any of Wagner's dramas to
understand the importance of considering the music and words together,
and to study the interaction between the poem and the score. The book
discusses the origins and development of 'Die Meistersinger' and the
final score. Appendices consider Wagner's sources.

%T Wagner and Wagenseil : A Source of Wagner's Opera 'Die Meistersinger'
%A Herbert Thompson
%D 1927
%C London
%I Humphrey Milford and Oxford Univ. Press
%X A concise treatment of Wagner's usage of J.C. Wagenseil's Nuremberg
chronicle, 'Buch von der Meistersinger holdseligen Kunst'. According to
Sir W.H. Hadow, "a book which is indispensable to all students of the
subject".
%O

%T Wagner's 'Meistersinger': Performance, History, Representation
%A Nicholas Vazsonyi (ed)
%D 2003
%C New York
%I Univ. of Rochester Press
%G ISBN 1 5804 6131 X
%X The first section of this volume, 'Performing Meistersinger',
contains three commissioned articles from internationally respected
artists - a conductor (Peter Schneider), a stage director (Harry Kupfer)
and a singer (Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau). The second section,
'Meistersinger and History', examines both the representation of German
history in the opera and the way the opera has functioned in history
through political appropriation and staging practice. The third section,
'Representations', is the most eclectic, exploring, among other topics,
the problematic question of genre from the perspective of a theatrical
historian.

%T Richard Wagner : 'Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg'
%A John Warrack (ed)
%A Michael Tanner
%A Lucy Beckett
%A Patrick Carnegy
%D 1994
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 521 44444 6 hbk 0 521 44895 6 pbk
%S Cambridge Opera Handbooks
%X John Warrack traces the evolution of 'Die Meistersinger' from plans for
a light comic opera or "satyr-play", through all the drafts and literary
influences on them, into the eventual comedy; he then presents an analysis
of the music, and investigates what Wagner found in the historical Master-
singers and their music. Lucy Beckett contributes an insightful essay into
the influence of Schopenhauer and the changes that this brought about in
the work as it developed. She also explores the complexity of expression
in the work. Michael Tanner suggests new ways of interpreting the opera's
inner and outer worlds. Patrick Carnegy provides a stage history.
Includes a synopsis, bibliography and three appendices: versions of the
'Wahn' monologue, Sachs' final address, and the Prize Song respectively.

%T The Master-Singers of Wagner
%A Cyril Winn
%D 1925
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%X
%O Paperback

------------------------------

Subject: G. Parsifal

WWV 111 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Modern
critical edition of the score published as volume 14 (ed. Egon Voss and
Martin Geck) of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the
development and initial reception of the work, together with rehearsal
notes from the 1882 premiere, published in volume 30 (same editors).

%T Wagner's 'Parsifal' : The Journey of a Soul
%A Peter Bassett
%D 2001
%C Kent Town, South Australia
%I Wakefield Press
%G ISBN 1 86254 512 X pbk
%X A long-overdue, perceptive study of Wagner's 'Parsifal'. For Bassett
the message of this work is that human salvation is to be achieved not
through the satisfaction of worldly desires but through compassion.
Wagner shows Parsifal's inner journey towards enlightenment through
compassion, in which he is able to ease the burdens of others. Bassett
has looked at the relationship between Wagner's sources and his text,
which is shown to owe more to those sources than many people suspect. He
limits his study to the medieval sources, however, overlooking the
allusions in Wagner's text to contemporary literature. In contrast to
the study by Lucy Beckett (see below), Peter Bassett paints a balanced
picture of the world-view behind 'Parsifal', taking into account
Wagner's interest in Buddhism and the impact that Buddhist ideas had
upon Wagner in general and this work in particular. Includes a synopsis,
a prose translation of the libretto, a chronological table and a short
bibliography.

%T Richard Wagner : 'Parsifal'
%A Lucy Beckett (ed)
%A Arnold Whittall
%D 1981
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 521 22825 5 hbk 0 521 29662 5 pbk
%S Cambridge Opera Handbooks
%X Beckett approaches 'Parsifal' as a profoundly and exclusively Christian
work; a view that some people, including the editor of this FAQ, find
unsatisfactory. Includes a thorough review of the reception history of
'Parsifal'. Whittall contributes some insightful comments on the score.
Unfortunately, by separating their analysis of text and music, the authors
fail to see how these are connected.

%T 'Parsifal' Reception in the Bayreuther Blätter
%A Mary A. Cicora
%D 1987
%C Frankfurt am Main, Berne and New York
%I Peter Lang Publishing
%G ISBN 0 8204 0385 7
%X Discusses articles by various contributors to the 'Blätter' and other
contemporary German periodicals, quoting generous extracts. With an
extensive bibliography.
%O Originally a doctoral thesis.

%T Parsifal : the Guileless Fool
%A Howard Duffield
%D 1904
%C New York
%I Dodd, Mead, and Co.
%X With an afterword by Fiona MacLeod.

%T Das Weltüberwindungswerk : Wagners 'Parsifal' - ein szenisch-
musikalisches Gleichnis der Philosophie Arthur Schopenhauers
%M German
%A Ulrike Kienzle
%D 1992
%C Laaber
%I Laaber Verlag
%G ISBN 3 8900 7276 3
%S Thurnauer Schrifter zum Musiktheater
%V 12
%X Although at present only available in German, this book is essential
reading for the student of 'Parsifal', the "work about overcoming the
world"; which Kienzle regards as a parable of the philosophy of
Arthur Schopenhauer. While her analysis is persuasive, it is not
complete. An understanding of 'Parsifal', it seems, was almost but not
quite within her grasp. Although Kienzle devotes sixteen pages to a
discussion of Kundry, she fails to interpret Kundry as a Schopenhauerian
metaphor. Therefore Kienzle has not fully understood what Kundry
represents (at least in Wagner's initial conception). Her references to
Schopenhauer are mostly to 'The World as Will and Representation'. The
latter book does not, however, contain the whole of Schopenhauer's
philosophy, and Kienzle's analysis would have benefited from closer
study of one of his essays on ethics, 'On the Basis of Morality'.

%T The 'Parsifal' of Richard Wagner: with accounts of the 'Perceval' of
Chrétien de Troies and the 'Parzival' of Wolfram von Eschenbach
%T Parsifal de Richard Wagner : Légende, drame, partition
%M French
%A Maurice Kufferath
%F Louise M. Henermann
%D 1904
%C New York
%I H. Holt and Co
%X With the leading motifs in musical notation and illustrations of the
scenes at the Metropolitan opera house.
%O Introduction by H.E. Krehbiel. French original published in 1890,
Paris.

%T Parsifal: The Finding of Christ Through Art or Richard Wagner As
Theologian
%A Albert Ross Parsons
%D 1997
%C
%I Kessinger Publishing Co.
%G ISBN 1 5645 9368 1 pbk
%X
%O

%T Parsifal
%A Hans Redlich
%D 1951
%C London
%I Boosey and Hawkes
%S Covent Garden Operas
%X Brief history of the opera, analysis (basic), with information on Wagner
and some suggested reading material.
%O

%T A Pagan Spoiled: Sex and Character in Wagner's 'Parsifal'
%A Anthony Winterbourne
%D 2003
%C Cranbury, NJ
%I Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press
%G ISBN 0 8386 3978 X
%X

%T Guide through the Music of R. Wagner's 'Parsifal'
%M German
%A Baron Hans von Wolzogen
%F J.H. Cornell
%D 1891
%C New York
%X Another of Wolzogen's thematic guides. The book also provides an account
of the mythical and literary background to the work as it was understood (not
always accurately) by Wolzogen.

------------------------------

Subject: H. Other Works

'Rienzi' appears as WWV 49 in the catalogue of Wagner's musical and
dramatic works. Modern critical edition of the score published as volume
3 of the 'Sämtliche Werke'. Documents relating to the development and
initial reception of the work are to be published in volume 23.

%T Wagner's 'Rienzi' : A reappraisal based on a study of the sketches and
drafts
%A John Deathridge
%D 1977
%C Oxford
%I Clarendon Press
%G ISBN
%X
%O

The abandoned dramatic project 'Die Sieger' is WWV 89 in the catalogue
of Wagner's musical and dramatic works. Documentation related to WWV 89
is to be published in volume 31 of the 'Sämtliche Werke'.

%T Richard Wagner's Buddha-Project 'Die Sieger' ('The Victors') :
Its traces in the ideas and structures of 'The Ring' and 'Parsifal'
%T Richard Wagners Buddha-Projekt 'Die Sieger' : Seine ideellen og
strukturellen Spuren in 'Ring' und 'Parsifal'
%M German
%A Wolfgang Osthoff
%F William Buchanan
%D 1996
%C Zürich
%I Museum Rietberg
%G ISBN 3 9070 7068 2
%X Lecture for the centenary of Wagner's death, given on 13 February
1983, in the Villa Wesendonck, now the Museum Rietberg. Osthoff
identified traces of the ideas associated with Wagner's Buddhist drama
'The Victors', and in particular his interest in reincarnation, in
'Siegfried', 'Götterdämmerung' and 'Parsifal'.
%O The translation is not as accurate as might be wished. The German
original was published in 'Arkiv für Musikwissenschaft' in 1983.

------------------------------

Subject: I. Musical Analysis

%T Das Geheimnis der Form bei Richard Wagner
%M German
%A Alfred Ottokar Lorenz
%D 1966 (reprint)
%C Tutzing
%I Hans Schneider
%V 4 volumes (Ring 1924, Tristan 1926, Meistersinger 1930, Parsifal 1933)
%X A classic analysis of Wagner's later stage works, in terms of simple
forms such as the 'bar' and the 'arch'.
%O Originally published 1924-33, Berlin, Hesse Verlag. See below for a
book about Lorenz.

%T Musical Structures in Wagnerian Opera
%A Marshall Tuttle
%D 2001
%C New York, Queenstown Ontario and Lampeter Wales
%I Edwin Mellen Press
%G ISBN 0 7734 7642 3
%S Studies in the History and Interpretation of Music
%V 65
%X

------------------------------

Subject: J. Other Commentary

%T Modern Myths and Wagnerian Deconstructions : Hermeneutic Approaches to
Wagner's Music-Dramas
%A Mary A. Cicora
%D 2000
%C Westport, CT
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 3133 0539 0
%X Poststructural analysis of Wagner's dramas. In particular discussing
Wagner's use of mythical material, which he claimed was an inexhaustible
source for the creative artist.

%T Wagner the Dramatist
%A Hugh Frederick Garten
%D 1985
%C London and New York
%I John Calder Ltd, Riverrun Press Inc.
%G ISBN 0 8476 6058 3
%X An account of Wagner's stage works and their sources.
%O First published in 1977.

%T Richard Wagner, 'Rienzi' to 'Parsifal'
%T Richard Wagner et son oeuvre poétique depuis Rienzi jusqu'à Parsifal
%M French
%A Judith Gautier
%D 1983 (reprint)
%C New York
%I Da Capo Press
%G ISBN 0 3067 6172 6
%X
%O Originally published in 1883.

%T Wagner's Operas
%A Lawrence Gilman
%D 1937
%C New York and Toronto
%I Farrar and Rinehart, Inc.
%X

%T The Musical Dramas of Richard Wagner
%A Paul H. Grummann
%D 1930
%C Lincoln, Nebraska
%I University of Nebraska Press
%X

%T The View from Afar
%T Le Regard Eloigné
%M French
%A Claude Lèvi-Strauss
%F Joachim Newgroschel
%F Phoebe Hoss
%D 1985
%C New York and Oxford
%I Basic Books Inc and Basil Blackwell Ltd
%G ISBN 0 631 13966 4
%X Contains the essays, 'A Note on the Tetralogy' and 'From Chrétien de
Troyes to Richard Wagner'. A structuralist view of Wagner's dramas.
%O Originally published in 1983.

%T Analyzing Wagner's Operas : Alfred Lorenz and the German Nationalist
Ideology
%A Stephen McClatchie
%D 1998
%C Rochester NY
%I University of Rochester Press
%G ISBN 1 5804 6023 2
%X Developed from the author's doctoral thesis, 'Alfred Lorenz as
Theorist and Analyst'.

%T Opera Guides
%A John Nicholas (ed)
%D 1980-1988
%C London and New York
%I John Calder Ltd, Riverrun Press Inc.
%S ENO/ROH Opera Guides
%V 6 (Tristan), 12 (Holländer), 19 (Meistersinger), 21 (Walküre), 28
(Siegfried), 31 (Götterdämmerung), 34 (Parsifal), 35 (Rheingold), 39
(Tannhäuser), 47 (Lohengrin)
%X Each of these pocket-size books contains a synopsis, essays (of variable
quality), a thematic guide, an English translation of the libretto, a brief
discography and a short bibliography, related to the work.

%T The Complete Operas of Richard Wagner : A Critical Guide
%A Charles Osborne
%D 1990
%C Cambridge MA and London
%I Da Capo Press, Victor Gollancz, Grange
%G ISBN 0 3068 0522 7 pbk, ISBN 0 5750 5380 1
%X A guide to Wagner's operas (including the three early ones).
Osborne's view of Wagner and his works is heavily influenced by Gutman,
and his claim that Wagner was a closet homosexual has not been widely
accepted. Although Wagner did spend a lot of time in his closet.

%T The Sources for the Music Dramas of Richard Wagner : Der Fliegende
Holländer, Tannh&auml;user, Lohengrin, Tristan, and Der Ring des Nibelungen.
%A James Henry Renz
%D 1956
%C Ann Arbor, MI
%I
%X
%O

%T The Legends of the Wagner Drama : Studies in Mythology and Romance
%A Jessie Laidlay Weston
%D 1896, 1900
%C London and New York
%I D. Nutt Ltd, Scribner's Sons Inc.
%X In his 'Ring' and in several other dramas ('Tannhäuser', 'Lohengrin',
'Tristan und Isolde' and 'Parsifal') Wagner drew upon the riches of
medieval literature. Jessie Weston is remembered mainly for her studies
of the Grail legend (in books such as 'The Quest of the Holy Grail', 'The
Legend of Sir Perceval' and 'From Ritual to Romance') and as a translator
into English of Wolfram's epic poem 'Parzival'. Weston was a dedicated
Wagnerian, regularly attending the Bayreuth Festival between 1890 and 1926.
In this book she reviewed the medieval sources both in their own right and
as sources used by Wagner. While some of her ideas have been discarded or
modified by later scholars, Weston's account of the medieval romances
remains as readable and interesting as it was on its publication a century
ago. Her insight into Wagner's use of the sources is intelligent and often
enlightening.
%O For a more detailed treatment of the medieval sources of 'Tristan und
Isolde' and 'Parsifal' respectively the reader with sufficient knowledge
of German will benefit from the respective studies by Wolfgang Golther
('Tristan und Isolde in der Dichtungen des Mittelalters und der neuen
Zeit', 1907, 'Parzival und der Gral in der Dichtungen des Mittelalters und
der Neuzeit', 1925).

%T Wagner Opera : Plots and Analyses
%A Audrey Williamson
%D 1982
%C London and New York
%I John Calder Ltd, Riverrun Press Inc.
%G ISBN 0 7145 0603 6 pbk
%X A guide to Wagner's stage works with a short biography.

------------------------------

Subject: K. Libretto Translations

Some of these translations are accompanied by extensive commentary.

%T The Ring of the Nibelungen
%F William Mann
%D 1964
%C London
%I Centurion Press Ltd
%V 4 volumes
%X An accurate translation of the Ring. Also issued with the Furtwängler
RAI recording of the cycle.
%O Originally published by the Friends of Covent Garden.

%T Richard Wagner : 'The Ring'
%F Andrew Porter
%D 1976
%C London
%I W W Norton and Co
%G ISBN 0 3930 0867 3
%X A singable translation of the 'Ring'. The English text of each the
'Ring' operas was reprinted in the separate ENO/ROH Opera Guides for each
of those operas.

%T 'Der Ring des Nibelungen' : A Companion, Translation and Commentary
%A Rudolph Sabor
%D 1997
%C London
%I Phaidon
%G ISBN 0 7148 3650 8
%V 5 volumes
%X Includes a new translation of the 'Ring', scene-by-scene synopses,
explanation of leitmotifs, bibliographies, discographies, and
commentary on the action. There is one volume for each part of the
tetralogy and a companion volume concerning the 'Ring' as a whole.
Sabor's is a poetic translation although it follows the German as
closely as possible; if not always in literal meaning then at least in
metre and rhyme pattern. Detailed references to the Leitmotiven by
"short names" allow the reader to follow the music in relation to the
words.

%T Wagner's 'Ring of the Nibelung' : The Full German Text with a New
Translation and Commentaries
%F Stewart Spencer
%A Barry Millington (ed)
%D 1993
%C London
%I Thames and Hudson
%G ISBN 0 500 01567 8
%X An annotated, literal translation of the 'Ring' including deleted text,
with related essays.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Subject: V. Books about Specialised Topics

Some of the books previously listed in this main section are now listed in
new main sections below. The others are now grouped in these subsections:

------------------------------
Subject: A. Literature

%T Richard Wagner and the Modern British Novel
%A John Louis DiGaetani
%D 1978
%C Cranbury NJ and London
%I Associated University Press, Fairleigh Dickinson
%G ISBN 0 8386 1955 X hbk, ISBN 0 8386 1795 6 pbk
%X

%T Wagner and Literature
%A Raymond Furness
%D 1982
%C Manchester
%I Manchester University Press
%G ISBN 0 3128 5347 5
%X

%T Wagner to 'The Waste Land' : A Study of the Relationship of Wagner to
English Literature
%A Stoddard Martin
%D 1982
%C London and Basingstoke
%I Macmillan, Barnes and Noble
%G ISBN 0 3332 8998 6, ISBN 0 3892 0250 9
%X

%T Joyce and Wagner : A Study of Influence
%A Timothy Peter Martin
%D 1991
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge Univ. Press
%G ISBN 0 5213 9487 2
%X Timothy Martin documents Joyce's exposure to Wagner's operas, and
defines a pervasive Wagnerian presence in his work. Wagner emerges as an
important source in the development of literary modernism, and as one of
Joyce's most important influences from the previous century. Exploring
such specific themes in Joyce's writings as the artist-hero, the problem
of exile, and redemption through a woman's love, Martin demonstrates
their origins in Wagner's work. Parallels are drawn between characters:
for example, Siegfried in the 'Ring' and Stephen Dedalus in 'A Portrait
of the Artist as a Young Man' ; the wandering captain in 'The Flying
Dutchman' and Leopold Bloom in 'Ulysses'. In a more general sense,
Martin finds that Joyce's works are Wagnerian in their underlying mythic
structure.

------------------------------
Subject: B. Philosophy

%T Nietzsche, Wagner and the Philosophy of Pessimism
%A Roger Hollinrake
%D 1982
%C London
%I Allen and Unwin
%G ISBN 0 04 921029 7
%X The author advances the interesting theory that 'Also Sprach
Zarathustra' was intended as a response to Wagner's 'Parsifal'.
Includes extracts from the Nietzsche-Wagner correspondence.

%T The Philosophy of Schopenhauer
%A Bryan Magee
%D 1997
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 1982 3722 7
%X Includes a chapter about Schopenhauer's influence on Wagner, one that
covers this subject in more depth than he does in his later book (see
below). Magee takes Wagner's attempt to correct Schopenhauer more
seriously than other commentators have done, explaining Wagner's problem
and his attempted solution in relation to 'Tristan'. Magee points out
the rather obvious (to anyone who has read Schopenhauer) traces of
Schopenhauer's influence on this drama and on 'Die Meistersinger'. In
his comments on 'Parsifal' Magee overlooks some Schopenhauerean ideas in
this drama that have been examined by more recent writers, notably Ulrike
Kienzle in 'Das Weltüberwindungswerk'.

%T Wagner and Philosophy (UK title)
%T The Tristan Chord (US title)
%A Bryan Magee
%D 2000, 2001
%C Oxford, New York
%I Oxford University Press, Metropolitan Books
%G ISBN 0 7139 9480 0 (UK), ISBN: 0 8050 6788 4 (US)
%X As Magee remarks at the beginning of this book, Wagner was the only one
of the "great composers" to take a serious interest in philosophy. His
later works would not be what they are without the ideas that he found in
the writings of contemporary philosophers (primarily Feuerbach in the
'Ring' and primarily Schopenhauer in 'Tristan', 'Mastersingers' and
'Parsifal'). Wagner's name is also closely associated with that of another
philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, although, as Magee explains, in this case
the influence flowed from composer to philosopher. The belief that there
was significant influence from Nietzsche to Wagner is one of those that
Magee shows to be false, in a chapter entitled "Wagner's Misleading
Reputation". Another falsehood is the view of Wagner as a proto-Nazi;
Magee devotes many pages to Wagner's political beliefs and activities. He
also discusses Wagner's attitude to religion and to the common ground of
religion and philosophy, i.e. metaphysics and ethics.

------------------------------
Subject: C. Politics

%T The Political Concepts of Richard Wagner
%T Les Idées politiques de Richard Wagner
%M French
%A Maurice Boucher
%F Marcel Honoré
%D 1950
%C New York
%I M&H Publications
%X With a short bibliography.
%O

%T Richard Wagner : Patriot and Politician
%A Frank B. Josserand
%D 1981
%C Washington DC
%I Univ. Press of America
%G ISBN 0 8191 1418 9
%X A study of Wagner's changing political convictions, commitment and
activities.
%O Printed from typescript.

%T The Darker Side of Genius : Richard Wagner's Anti-Semitism
%T Richard Wagner : Vorbote des Antisemitismus
%M German?
%A Jacob Katz
%D 1986
%C Hanover NH
%I University Press of New England
%G ISBN 0 87451 368 5
%S Tauber Institute for the study of European Jewry series
%X Katz considers both the role of Richard Wagner in the history of
modern anti-Semitism and the role of anti-Semitism in the life of Richard
Wagner.

%T Wagner's Hitler : The Prophet and His Disciple
%T Wagners Hitler : Der Prophet und sein Vollstrecker
%M German
%A Joachim Köhler
%F Ronald Taylor
%D 2000
%C New Haven and London
%I Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd
%G ISBN 0 7456 2239 9
%X A detailed study of the relationship between Richard Wagner and
Adolf Hitler. Köhler argues that the influence of Richard and Cosima
Wagner and their associates played a vital role in shaping the cultural
context in which Nazism developed. More controversially, Köhler claims
that both Wagner's writings and his music-dramas were a formative
influence on Hitler. Also that Hitler's experience of Wagner's stage
works (from 'Rienzi' to 'Parsifal') was the source of his megalomania.
An unhappy blend of fact (too little) and fiction (too much).

%T Wagner : Race and Revolution
%A Paul Lawrence Rose
%D 1992
%C London
%I Yale University Press
%G ISBN 0 3000 6745 3
%X See the discussion of Rose's theories in the general Wagner FAQ.

%T Imagined Germany : Richard Wagner's National Utopia
%A Hannu Salmi
%D 1999
%C New York
%I Peter Lang Publishing
%G ISBN 0 8204 4416 2
%S German Life and Civilization
%V 29
%X

%T The Racial Thinking of Richard Wagner
%A Leon Stein
%D 1950
%C New York
%I Philosophical Library
%X A study of Wagner's anti-Semitism and pan-Germanism.

%T The Ring of Myths: Israelis, Wagner and the Nazis
%A Na'ama Sheffi
%D 2000 (hbk), 2003 (pbk)
%C
%I Sussex Academic Press
%G ISBN 1 9022 1052 2
%X Laon writes: "Na'ama Sheffi's account of the Israeli 'ban' on Wagner's
music ranges through 60-odd years of Israeli cultural and political
history, and is considerably more subtle and nuanced than this brief
outline can reveal. Israeli politics are both labyrinth and minefield,
and the clarity of Sheffi's guidance through the twists and turns is
something the reader can both admire and be grateful for.
Sheffi reveals that the Israeli ban was a historical accident: in 1938
the Palestine Orchestra (principally made up of Jews from Eastern
Europe) protested against Kristallnacht by dropping the 'Meistersinger'
overture from their next concert. The gesture was hurried but not
unreasonable: the Nazis used 'Die Meistersinger' for propaganda
purposes, as they misappropriated other German music and art: Beethoven,
Bruckner, Goethe and Rembrandt in particular. Since then Wagner has been
made into a symbol of the holocaust and shorthand for Nazism, a symbol
with little relationship to the actual historical personage, who, she
observes, "did not devote his life to denigrating Jews and certainly not
to annihilating them." Sheffi argues that using Wagner in this way not
only perpetuates a falsehood but also directs attention away from the
individuals, political groups and social forces that really created and
operated the Holocaust. The Israeli ban endorses the Nazis' malicious
misreadings of Wagner; thus it remains a homage to rather than a
repudiation of Nazi cultural thought. A genuine rejection of Nazi ideas
necessarily involves dismissing their claim to Wagner.
Sheffi does not know her Wagner quite as well as she knows Israel,
however. For example she is too credulous in relation to the various
readings of anti-Semitic meanings into Wagner's works. She also commits
occasional solecisms like, 'Wagner had been on close terms with his
son-in-law'. Namely, H.S. Chamberlain, a man who once saw Richard Wagner
from a distance but who never met him. Here Sheffi has fallen into the
trap of trusting some of the makers of the 'Ring of Myths' of her title,
who tend to fudge the distance between Wagner and Chamberlain, a writer
who really did contribute to Nazi ideology.
This is a thoughtful, generally well-researched and referenced book,
clearly written, and showing alertness to nuances of meaning in a field
where attention to nuance is a rare commodity."
%O

------------------------------
Subject: D. Religion

%T Richard Wagner : A Mystic in the Making
%A Alan Aberbach
%D 1991
%C
%I Longwood Academic
%G ISBN 0 89341 662 2
%X

%T Richard Wagner's Religious Ideas : A Spiritual Journey hbk
%T Richard Wagner's Spiritual Pilgrimage pbk
%A Alan Aberbach
%D 1998
%C New York, Queenstown Ontario and Lampeter Wales
%I Edwin Mellen Press
%G ISBN 0 7734 8783 2 hbk 0 7734 8348 9 pbk
%X An in-depth examination of Richard Wagner's religious, spiritual and
mystical thoughts, intended to provide the reader
with a better understanding of his works. The author presents Richard
Wagner as a seeker and a pilgrim, whose thoughts about God, man's place
in the universe, and the individual and collective destinies of mankind
can be traced both in his writings and in his dramas. In this account
particular attention is given to two influences who have been largely
overlooked by Wagner biographers: the Sufi poet Hafiz, and the Domenican
mystic, Meister Eckhart.

%T Women and the Changing Concept of Salvation in the Operas of Richard
Wagner
%A Jeffrey Peter Bauer
%D 1994
%C Anif, Salzburg
%I Verlag Ursula Müller-Speiser
%G ISBN 3 85145 020 5
%X

%T Richard Wagner och den indiska tankevärlden
%T Richard Wagner und die Indische Geisteswelt (German translation)
%M Swedish
%A Carl Suneson
%F Gert Kreutzer (German translation)
%D 1985
%C Stockholm, Leiden
%I Almqvist and Wiksell International, Brill Academic Publishers Inc.
%G ISBN 91 22 00775 X (S), ISBN 9 0040 8859 8 (DE)
%S Stockholm Oriental Studies
%V 13
%X This is the only extended study of Richard Wagner's interest in
Indian literature and religions, and their influence on his works. This
book is in three parts: 1. Wagner's Impressions of India, 2. Wagnerian
Aesthetics and Indian Metaphysics, 3. India in the Music Dramas. The
growth of Indian studies in the early nineteenth century was followed
with interest by Schopenhauer, who passed on this interest to his
disciple Richard Wagner. The Buddhist idea of renunciation in particular
appealed to Wagner during his relationship with Mathilde Wesendonk. His
use of Indian symbols and motifs in some of his later works reflects, in
Suneson's view, the conflict between ascetic and aesthetic strivings. In
this respect the unfinished music drama 'Die Sieger' (The Victors) stands
alone as a work entirely based on an Indian source. Suneson argues that
the Indian elements in these later dramas were introduced by Wagner not
as exotic elements but as congenial to his own personality and with his
deepest felt artistic needs.
%O The original is in Swedish, but it has been translated into German.

%T The Buddhist Nirvana and its Western Interpreters
%A Guy Richard Welbon
%D 1968
%C Chicago and London
%I Univ. of Chicago Press
%X This book traces the history of Western Europe's contact with and
evaluation of Buddhism from the first references by Christian writers
to the beginning of the 20th century. It concentrates on the reception
of the alien concepts of Buddhism (and other religions of Indian origin)
after the first translations of Buddhist scriptures into European
languages appeared in the middle of the 19th century, with particular
reference to the concept of 'nirvana'. Western scholars had difficulties
in interpreting this concept and in reconciling the different meanings
with which it appeared in Mahayana scriptures, and later with those found
in Theravada scriptures. The author devotes a chapter to three non-
specialists who followed the scholarly dispute about the meaning of
'nirvana' with particular interest, and to their responses to 'nirvana':
Arthur Schopenhauer, Richard Wagner and Friedrich Nietzsche.

------------------------------
Subject: E. Sex and Gender

%T The Prodigious Lover : New Aspects in the Life of Richard Wagner
%T La vie amoureuse de Richard Wagner
%M French
%A Louis Barthou
%F Henry Irving Brock
%D 1927
%C New York
%I Duffield and Company
%X

%T The Loves of Richard Wagner (UK title)
%T The Women in Wagner's Life (US title)
%T Richard Wagner und die Frauen
%M German
%A Julius Kapp
%D 1951
%C London
%I W.H. Allen
%X

%T Wagner's Operas and Desire
%A James M. McGlathery
%D 1998
%C New York
%I Peter Lang Publishing
%G ISBN 0 8204 3693 3
%X The ten canonical works are examined with special attention to the role
of erotic passion.
%O

%T Wagner Androgyne : A Study in Interpretation
%T Wagner Androgyne : Essai sur l'interpretation
%M French
%A Jean-Jacques Nattiez
%F Stewart Spencer
%D 1993
%C Princeton NJ
%I Princeton University Press
%G ISBN 0 6910 4832 0
%X The author's theme is that of androgyny in Wagner and his works. The
word androgyne is used here in a broader sense than "hermaphrodite",
however, Indeed it might be argued that he was not writing about
androgyny at all but about the complementary polarities of male and
female, or of the eternal masculine and the eternal feminine. It is
beyond doubt that Wagner regarded the union of these polarities as
necessary for the psychic health and wholeness both of individuals and
of society and that this need is a recurring theme in Wagner's dramas.
It also provides a sexual metaphor that dominates his most important
theoretical treatise 'Opera and Drama'. From this treatise together with
'The Art-Work of the Future' and other writings, Nattiez develops and
presents an interpretation of the 'Ring' cycle as the history of music
and related arts, divided by the decline of classical tragedy and reborn
united in the total work of art, the art-work of the future. He then
returns to the theme of androgyny, attempts to psychoanalyse Wagner and
discusses a host of more or less related subjects. Although there is not
much in the book that is entirely original, in it Nattiez has drawn
together many disparate threads of analysis and interpretation which he
examines from a new angle, that of androgyny and gender.
%O Originally published in 1990 in French. The appendix containing a
translation of the first prose version of 'Wieland the Smith' was
omitted from the American edition. The original German text, together
with an English translation by Spencer, can be found in 'Wagner', 1994,
vol.10 no.1, pp.3-23.

------------------------------
Subject: F. Theatre

%T Richard Wagner : Theory and Theatre
%T Das Theater Richard Wagners
%M German
%A Dieter Borchmeyer
%F Stewart Spencer
%D 1991
%C Oxford UK
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 19 315322 X
%X Discusses Richard Wagner's aesthetic theory, examining his prose
writings and his ideas on music drawn from various standpoints of
literature, the linking of ideas and the sociology of art. Also examines
the importance of Greek art and mythology and his links with major
figures in world theatre.
%O Originally published in 1982.

%T Leitmotiv and Drama : Wagner, Brecht and the Limits of Epic Theatre
%A Hilda Meldrum Brown
%D 1991
%C Oxford
%I Oxford University Press
%G ISBN 0 1981 6227 8 hbk
%X

%T Schiller and Wagner : a Study of their Dramatic Theory and Technique
%A Marie Haefliger Graves
%D 1938
%C Ann Arbor, MI
%I Published by the author.
%X Graves compares the dramatic techniques of Schiller and Wagner, and
discusses the influence of Shakespeare and classical Greek drama on both
dramatists.
%O Reprinted in 1947

%T The Influence of Shakespeare on Richard Wagner
%A Margaret Inwood
%D 2000
%C New York, Queenstown Ontario and Lampeter Wales
%I Edwin Mellen Press
%G ISBN 0 7734 7774 8
%S Studies in the History and Interpretation of Music
%V 64
%X

%T Richard Wagner and Festival Theater
%A Simon Williams
%D 1994
%C Westport CT and London
%I Praeger
%G ISBN 0 2759 3608 2 pbk 0 3132 7435 5 hbk
%X This biographical study focuses primarily on Wagner as an important
figure in the development of European theatre, in particular his
involvement with the founding of the Bayreuth Festival.

%T Wagner's Dramas and Greek Tragedy
%A Pearl Cleveland Wilson
%D 1919
%C New York
%I Columbia University Press
%X On the basis of Wagner's theoretical writings, Wilson explored the
parallels between the 'Ring' and Greek tragedy, especially with reference
to the 'Oresteia' of Aeschylus. See the later study by Michael Ewans
(below).
%O Originally a dissertation.

------------------------------
Subject: G. Other

%T Wagner and Debussy
%A Robin Holloway
%D 1979
%C London
%I Eulenburg
%G ISBN 0 9038 7325 7
%X

%T Wagner and Beethoven : Richard Wagner's Reception of Beethoven
%T Wagner und Beethoven : Untersuchung zur Beethoven-Rezeption Richard
Wagners
%M German
%A Klaus Kropfinger
%F Peter Palmer
%D 1991
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 5213 4201 5
%X The impact of Beethoven's music on Wagner and its importance for his
conception of music drama. Kropfinger charts and scrutinizes Wagner's
early responses to the composer and considers his experience as a
conductor of Beethoven's music.

%T Richard Wagner: A Guide to Research
%A Michael Saffle
%D 2001
%C London
%I Routledge
%G ISBN 0 8240 5695 7
%X It must be assumed that the enormity of the task, and his lack of
qualifications to execute it, had not dawned on the author before he was
too far into this project to abandon it. Despite his best intentions,
the result is simply a mess: some of the 1175 items cited in this Guide
are derivative or trivial contributions to the vast literature, while
seminal contributions to it have been overlooked. Most of the entries
contain errors, suggesting that the book or article cited has received
no more than a cursory examination. In many cases Saffle's description
of the book or article bears no resemblence to its contents. For
example, Saffle tells us that Nietzsche's 'Richard Wagner in Bayreuth'
contains "impressions of the 1876 Bayreuth Festival", despite the fact
that it was published before that Festival was held. In other cases the
book or article is correctly described but information that might be
needed by a scholar is omitted. For example, Saffle describes the study
by Max Unger, 'The Cradle of the Parsifal Legend' (1932), which was
based on research by Suhtscheck-Hauschka, but fails to tell the reader
that this research was based on inaccurate translation of the Persian
sources and generally misguided.
It is hard to understand how the publishers could leave the preparation
of this book in the hands of an author who knew so little about Wagner
that he could not even get the titles of the composer's major works right,
either in the original language or in translation -- he believes for
example that Wagner wrote 'Die Liebesverbot', 'Le hollandaise Volant'
and 'The Valkyries' -- or why an individual who believes that the
libretto of 'Die Zauberflöte' was written by Da Ponte and that the
'Altenberg Lieder' are the work of Anton von Webern, is writing about
opera and music. The author's evident confusion about the Wagner family
is hard to excuse, when several of the books cited (such as Wolfgang
Wagner's autobiography) contain a diagram of the family tree.
It would have been better to concentrate (at least in the first volume
of what should be a multi-volume reference work) on primary material
that has been published in German, English and French: Wagner's
libretti, prose works, autobiography, diaries, and the many publications
containing parts of his correspondence; together with key reference
works such as von Westernhagen's Dresden catalogue (here inaccurately
described by Saffle), and maybe relevant writings about Wagner by
contemporaries. With such restrictions it might be possible to select,
describe and evaluate a core of less than 1000 items. This tighter focus
would have helped ensure sufficient accuracy. In short: the scholar will
find little guidance here. The book in its present form and with its
present quality is worthless, except perhaps as a source of unintended
humour.

%T Richard Wagner and the Anti-Semitic Imagination
%A Marc A. Weiner
%D 1995
%C Lincoln NE
%I University of Nebraska Press
%G ISBN 0 8032 4775 3
%X Weiner tries very hard to find anti-Semitism in Wagner's operas. In
the process he reads much between the lines of Wagner's text that more
objective readers might not find there, and Weiner also cites many other
writers in support of his theories which, if the reader cares to examine
the books cited, do not support -- and more often contradict -- those
theories. Although Weiner clearly knows nothing about music, he advances
arguments supposedly based on analysis of Wagner's music, and succeeds
only in exposing his own ignorance and stupidity. The real tragedy of
this book is that, inside this long rant about Wagner's anti-Semitism
and its supposed manifestations in the operas, there is a readable book
about Wagner and the body, struggling to get out.
%O Reprinted in 1997 with a new postscript.

------------------------------

Subject: VI. Wagner's Own Writings and Correspondence

For a general overview of Wagner's prose and poetry, or for an overview
of editions of his correspondence, please see the relevant sections of
the general Wagner FAQ. Unless otherwise stated, each of the following
books is in one volume.

------------------------------

Subject: A. Correspondence

%T Letters of Richard Wagner
%T Richard Wagners Briefe
%A Wilhelm Altmann (ed)
%F Mildred Mary Bozman
%D 1927
%C London and Toronto
%I J. M. Dent & Co.
%V 2 volumes
%X Translations of 738 letters written by Wagner.
%O German original published in 1925, Leipzig.

%T Letters of Hans von Bülow to Richard Wagner, Cosima Wagner, his Daughter
Daniela, Luise von Bülow, Karl Klindworth, and Carl Bechstein
%M German
%A Richard Du Moulin-Eckart (ed)
%D 1983
%C
%I Horizon Press
%G ISBN 0 8443 0051 9
%X

%T Letters of Richard Wagner : The Burrell Collection
%T Richard Wagner Briefe : Die Sammlung Burrell
%A John Naglee Burk (ed)
%D 1951
%C New York and London
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd
%X Translations of 435 letters written by Wagner and collected by Mary
Burrell.
%O Originally published in English, this book later appeared in German.

%T Family Letters of Richard Wagner
%T Familienbriefe von Richard Wagner
%F William Ashton Ellis
%A John Deathridge (ed)
%D 1991
%C Basingstoke
%I Univ of Michigan Press, Macmillan Reference
%G ISBN 0 4721 0292 3, ISBN 0 3334 4438 8
%X A collection of letters from Richard Wagner to his family, containing
material on his early years. First published at the beginning of the century,
this volume includes notes which comment on this historical translation in
the light of modern scholarship.
%O First published in English translation 1911, based on Glasenapp's German
edition of 1907.

%T Letters of Richard Wagner to Emil Heckel : With a brief account of the
Bayreuth Festivals
%F William Ashton Ellis
%A Carl Heckel (ed)
%D 1899
%C London
%I Grant Richards
%X Also includes reminiscences of Wagner by Emil Heckel.

%T Richard to Minna Wagner : Letters to his First Wife
%T Richard Wagner an Minna Wagner
%F William Ashton Ellis
%D 1909
%C London
%I H. Grevel & Co.
%V 2 volumes
%X First published in German in 1908.

%T Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonk
%T Richard Wagner an Mathilde Wesendonk : Tagebuchblätter und Briefe
1853-1871
%M German
%F William Ashton Ellis
%D 1972
%C London
%I Vienna House Inc, Milford House
%G ISBN 0 8443 0010 1, ISBN 0 8782 1020 2
%X Essential background on 'Tristan', 'Parsifal' and 'Die Sieger'.
%O Originally published by Grant Richards, London, in 1905, based
on Wolfgang Golther's edition of 1904 in German.

%T Richard et Cosima Wagner - Arthur Gobineau Correspondance
%M French
%A Eric Eugène (ed)
%D 2000
%C Saint-Genouph
%I Librairie Nizet
%G ISBN 2 7078 1258 7
%X Correspondence between the Wagners and the self-styled 'Count' Arthur
Gobineau, in 1880-82, the last years of the lives of Richard Wagner
(d.1883) and Gobineau (d.1882). The correspondence consists of 79
letters, of which 49 are by Gobineau (43 to Cosima, 4 to Richard and 2
to Eva Wagner), 28 are by Cosima and only 2 by Richard Wagner. These
letters, taken together with entries in Cosima's Diaries, present a very
different picture of the relationship between Gobineau and the Wagners
from that described by Gutman and Rose. It puts the supposed 'influence'
of Gobineau upon Wagner (who began to read Gobineau's books in November
1880, when he took up 'La Renaissance') in its proper perspective.
"By publishing a critical edition of these new letters, I present for
my readers Gobineau's response to Wagner. Deferent but without conceding
an inch, Gobineau rejected Wagner's accusations and stood his ground.
This correspondence is essential to an understanding of how these two men
could have maintained rather friendly relations while they were in total
opposition on the intellectual level. It also confirms the determination
of Wagner to see 'the unity of mankind'." (From the editor's introduction)
%O See also: 'Wagner et Gobineau. Existe-t-il un racisme wagnérien?', by
Eric Eugène and Serge Karlsfeld, 1998.

%T Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt
%F Francis Hueffer
%D Recently republished
%C McLean, Virginia
%I IndyPublish
%G ISBN 1 58827 295 8 hbk, 1 58827 296 6 pbk
%V Two volumes.
%X This modern edition contains a very brief, anonymous and ill-informed
biographical sketch. The translator's preface is rather better written and,
most important of all, the letters are translated into readable English.
They leave a more positive impression of Franz Liszt, as a tolerant and
forgiving friend, than the picture they paint of Richard Wagner.
%O Originally published by H. Grevel & Co., London, in 1897.

%T The Nietzsche-Wagner Correspondence
%T Wagner und Nietzsche der Zeit ihrer Freundschaft
%M German
%A Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche (ed)
%F Caroline V. Kerr
%D 1922
%C London
%I
%X Nietzsche's sister Elisabeth partly suppressed and altered some of
these letters, apparently in order to support her claims that her brother
had broken with Richard Wagner as a result of the latter's 'betrayal'.
With an introduction by H.L. Mencken. For a more complete picture of this
correspondence, see the 'Gesamtausgabe' edited by G. Colli and M. Montinari.
%O German original published 1915, Munich.

%T The Story of Bayreuth as Told in the Bayreuth Letters of Richard Wagner
%A Caroline V. Kerr
%D 1912
%C Boston MA and London
%I Small, Maynard & Co., James Nisbet & Co.
%X

%T The Letters of Richard Wagner to Anton Pusinelli
%F Elbert Lenrow
%D 1983
%C New York
%I Horizon Press
%G ISBN 0 8443 0104 3
%X Also includes letters from Pusinelli to Wagner.
%O Originally published in 1932, Knopf.

%T Richard Wagner's Letters to August Roeckel
%F E.C. Sellar
%D 1897
%C Bristol
%I J. W. Arrowsmith
%X With an introduction by Houston Stewart Chamberlain.

%T Richard Wagner's Letters to his Dresden Friends : Theodor Uhlig,
Wilhelm Fischer and Ferdinand Heine
%F J.S. Shedlock
%D 1890
%C London
%I Vienna House Inc.
%G ISBN 0 8443 0006 3
%X
%O Originally published in 1890.

%T Selected Letters of Richard Wagner
%F Stewart Spencer
%A Barry Millington (ed)
%D 1987, 1988
%C London, New York
%I J.M.Dent and Sons Ltd
%G ISBN 0 460 04643 8
%X A critical edition of over 500 letters in English translation.
Michael Tanner writes: "Many thousands of Wagner's letters survive, but
many of the most significant for an understanding of his dramas are to
be found in this large, compulsively readable volume".

%T Richard Wagner : Sämtliche Briefe
%A Werner Breig
%A Andreas Mielke
%A Gertrud Strobel
%A Werner Wolf
%A Hans-Joachim Bauer
%A Johannes Forner
%A Isabel Kraft
%D 1967-
%C Leipzig, Wiesbaden and Paris
%I Originally VEB Deutscher Verlag für Musik, now Breitkopf und Härtel
%V Fourteen volumes have been published in an edition that might eventually
contain thirty volumes.
%X All of Wagner's surviving letters in their original languages. The
letters so far published were all written before the end of 1862.

------------------------------

Subject: B. Diaries of Richard and Cosima Wagner

For an overview of the diaries, see the main FAQ, section IV-A-iv. The
little that survives of the 'Red Pocketbook' was published in volume I
of the 'Sämtliche Briefe', pages 81-84.

%T The Diary of Richard Wagner 1865-1882 : The Brown Book
%T Das Braune Buch : Tagebuchaufzeichningen 1865-1882
%M German
%A Richard Wagner
%A Joachim Bergfeld (ed)
%F George Bird
%D 1980
%C London
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd
%G ISBN 0 575 02628 6
%X Wagner's occasional diary and notebook.
%O German original published in 1975, Zürich.

%T Cosima Wagner's Diaries
%T Cosima Wagner : Die Tagebücher 1869-1883
%M German
%A Cosima Wagner
%A Martin Gregor-Dellin (ed)
%A Dieter Mack (ed)
%F Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1978-1980
%C London and New York
%I William Collins Sons and Co Ltd
%G ISBN 0 00 216130 3 (vol. 1) and 0 00 216189 3 (vol. 2)
%V 2 volumes
%X After being suppressed for many years, the surviving text of the
diaries was published in German in 1976 and in English from 1978.
%O Originally published in 1976-1977.

%T Cosima Wagner's Diaries : An Abridgement
%M German
%A Cosima Wagner
%F Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1994
%C London and New York
%I Pimlico Press, Yale Univ Press, Rider and Co.
%G ISBN 0 3000 6904 9, ISBN 0 7126 5952 8
%X Selected entries from Cosima's diaries in English translation.

------------------------------

Subject: C. Prose Writings

For editions of Wagner's prose and poetry in German, see the main FAQ,
section IV-A-ii.

%T Wagner's Aesthetics
%A Carl Dahlhaus (ed)
%D 1972
%C Bayreuth
%I Edition Musica
%X A selection of eight items from Wagner's writings, which had appeared
in Bayreuth Festival programme books during the 1970's.
%O Also published in German and in French.

%T Beethoven
%M German
%A Richard Wagner
%F Edward Dannreuther
%D 2001 (reprint)
%C
%I Best Books, Messageries du Livre
%G ISBN 0 7222 5350 8 hbk, ISBN 2 0702 6595 1 pbk
%X
%O

%T On Conducting : A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music
%M German
%A Richard Wagner
%F Edward Dannreuther
%D 1989 (reprint)
%C New York
%I Dover Publications, Inc.
%G ISBN 0 4862 5932 3
%X Almost continually in print since it was written, Dannreuther's
translation is available as an alternative to that by Ellis.
%O Originally published in 1887

%T Richard Wagner's Prose Works
%M German and French
%A Richard Wagner
%F William Ashton Ellis
%D 1993-96 (paperback reprint)
%C Lincoln and London
%I Bison Books, Univ. of Nebraska
%G ISBN 0 8032 9763 N
%X Ellis' translation is not always easy to read, but then neither is the
German original. Nor is the translation always accurate. Michael Tanner
writes: "This translation, made by the bizarre William Ashton Ellis, is
into a language only remotely related to English as anyone else knows
it."
%O Originally published in 1892-99.

%T Wagner on Music and Drama : A Compendium of Richard Wagner's Prose Works
%A Richard Wagner
%A Albert Harry Goldman (ed)
%A Evert Sprinchorn (ed)
%F William Ashton Ellis
%D 1988
%C New York
%I Da Capo Press
%G ISBN 0 3068 0319 4
%X Selections from Wagner's prose writings, grouped under the following
headings: Cultural Decadence of the Nineteenth Century; The Greek Ideal;
The Origins of Modern Opera, Drama, and Music; The Artwork of the Future;
Wagner's Development; Bayreuth; Politics. J.K. Holman writes: "This
book, recently reissued, is a necessary reference tool for those who
wish to read Wagner as well as hear him".
%O Previously published by E.P. Dutton in 1964.

%T Three Wagner Essays
%A Richard Wagner
%F Robert Jacobs
%D 1979
%C London
%I St Martins Press
%G ISBN 0 3122 2696 9
%X 'Music of the Future'; 'On Conducting' (slightly abridged) and 'On
Performing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony'.

%T Wagner Writes from Paris : Stories, Essays and Articles by the Young
Composer Richard Wagner
%F Robert Jacobs
%F Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1973
%C London
%I John Day
%X

%T Richard Wagner : Stories and Essays
%A Richard Wagner
%F Charles Osborne
%D 1991
%C La Salle IL
%I Open Court
%X Paperback reissue. Includes 'The Wibelungen' and 'Judaism in Music'.
%O Previously published by The Library Press, NY, 1973, and Peter Owen,
London, 1973.

%T Reading Wagner : A Study in the History of Ideas
%A Lelland Joseph Rather
%D 1990
%C Baton Rouge and London
%I Louisiana University State Press
%G ISBN 0 8071 1557 6
%X Consists mostly of extracts from Wagner's writings.

------------------------------

Subject: VII. Wagner Family and Bayreuth

The following books are, wholly or partly, concerned with topics such as
the Festival Theatre, the Bayreuth Festival after 1883, and the "royal
family of Bayreuth".

%T Richard Wagner : Life, Work, Festspielhaus
%A Herbert Barth
%D 1952
%C Bayreuth
%I Verlag der Festspielleitung Bayreuth
%X
%Q Festspielleitung Bayreuth

%T The Centenary 'Ring' in Bayreuth : a Critical Examination of the Tetralogy
which Marked the 100th Anniversary of the Bayreuth Festival
%T Der Jubiläums-Ring in Bayreuth 1976 : e. krit. Auseinandersetzung mit d.
Neu-Inszenierung d. Tetralogie zum 100jährigen Bestehen d. Bayreuther
Festspiele
%M German
%A Uwe Faerbe
%F Stewart Spencer
%D 1977
%C Berlin
%I Bote und Bock
%X

%T Wagner, Bayreuth, and the Festival Plays
%A Frances Gerard
%D 1901
%C London
%I Jarrold & sons
%X With illustrations and specially engraved portrait of Wagner.

%T Bayreuth : The Early Years : an account of the Early Decades of the
Wagner Festival as seen by the Celebrated Visitors & Participants.
%A Robert Hartford (ed)
%D 1980
%C Cambridge and New York
%I Cambridge Univ. Press
%G ISBN 0 575 02865 3
%X The most important and interesting eye-witness accounts of the early
Bayreuth festivals, by such musical luminaries as Tchaikovsky and Grieg,
and a host of other interested observers.

%T Theater Design : with two essays on the room acoustics of multiple-use
%A George C. Izenour
%A Vern O. Knudsen
%A Robert B. Newman
%D 1977
%C New York
%I McGraw-Hill
%G ISBN 0 07 032086 1
%X Contains a chapter about the design of the Festspielhaus.

%T The Music Dramas of Richard Wagner and his Festival Theatre in Bayreuth
%T Le voyage artistique à Bayreuth
%M French
%A Albert Lavignac
%F Esther Singleton
%D 1969 (reprint)
%C New York and London
%I Haskell House Publishers
%X Lavignac's book was written for French-speaking visitors to Bayreuth.
It contains an introduction to the town of Bayreuth, the Festival and its
theatre; a brief and rather inaccurate biography of Wagner (which is of
interest, however, as a document of the "official version" promoted by
Wahnfried some 25 years after Wagner's death); an analysis of the poems;
a separate analysis of the music (drawing on Wolzogen) and finally some
notes on performances of the music-dramas at the Bayreuth Festival from
1876 to 1896.
%O Originally published in 1898, reprinted 1917, 1921 and 1924.

%T Theatre and Playhouse : An Illustrated History of Theatre Building from
Ancient Greece to the Present Day
%A Richard Leacroft and Helen Leacroft
%D 1984
%C London
%I Methuen
%G ISBN 0 413 52940 1 pbk, 0 413 52930 4 hbk
%X

%T Bayreuth in 1912
%A Algernon Bertram Freeman Mitford, Lord Redesdale
%D 1912
%C London
%I Ballantyne Press
%X

%T Wieland Wagner : The Positive Sceptic
%A Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1971
%C London
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd
%G ISBN 575 00709 5 222
%X

%T Wagner at Bayreuth : Experiment and Tradition
%A Geoffrey Skelton
%D 1976
%C London
%I Barrie & Rockliff
%X Foreword by Wieland Wagner.
%O Originally published in 1965.

%T Bayreuth : A History of the Wagner Festival
%A Frederic Spotts
%D 1994
%C New Haven and London
%I Yale University Press
%G ISBN 0 300 05777 6
%X A history of the festival and a chronicle of the Wagner family, those
"eccentric, feuding, scandalous descendants" of Richard and Cosima Wagner.

%T New Bayreuth
%A Penelope Turing
%D 1969
%C St. Martin, Jersey, C.I.
%I Jersey Artists (distributed by Spearman)
%X Turing first attended the Bayreuth Festival in 1952. This book contains
her reminiscences of that Festival and each subsequent Festival up to and
including that of 1968. Although her advice on travel arrangements is of
limited value today, Turing's suggestions for excursions on "spielfrei" days
during the Festival are worthy of consideration by modern pilgrims.

%T Heritage of Fire : The Story of Richard Wagner's Granddaughter
%T Nacht über Bayreuth: die Geschichte der Enkelin Richard Wagners
%M German
%A Friedelind Wagner
%A Eva Weissweiler (introduction)
%A Page Cooper
%D 1945
%C New York and London
%I Harper & brothers
%X

%T He who does not howl with the wolf : the Wagner legacy, an autobiography
%T Twilight of the Wagners : the unveiling of a family's legacy (pbk title)
%T Wer nicht mit dem Wolf heult : autobiographische Aufzeichnungen eines
Wagner-Urenkels
%M German
%A Gottfried Wagner
%F Della Couling
%D 1998
%C London
%I Sanctuary
%G ISBN 1 86074 228 9 hbk, 1 86074 251 3 pbk
%X Gottfried explains at great length how his family have prevented him from
achieving anything with his life.

%T The Wagners : The Dramas of a Musical Dynasty
%T Wagner Theatre
%M German
%A Nike Wagner
%F Ewald Osers
%F Michael Downes
%D 2000
%C London
%I Weidenfeld and Nicolson
%G ISBN 0 2976 4315 0
%X Nike Wagner draws on history, biography, and psychoanalysis to
interpret both her family's history and her great-grandfather's operas.

%T The Wagner Family Albums : Bayreuth 1876-1976
%T Die Geschichte unserer Familie in Bildern : Bayreuth 1876-1976
%M German
%A Wolf Siegfried Wagner
%D 1976
%C London
%I Thames and Hudson
%X With contributions by Winifred Wagner, Gertrud Wagner and Nike Wagner.

%T Richard Wagner und das neue Bayreuth : Zur Diskussion um den neuen
Führungsstil.
%M German
%A Wieland Wagner (ed)
%D 1962
%C Munich
%I
%X

%T Acts : The Autobiography of Wolfgang Wagner
%T Lebens-Akte
%M German
%A Wolfgang Wagner
%F John Brownjohn
%D 1994
%C London
%I Weidenfeld and Nicolson
%G ISBN 0 297 81349 8
%X Wolfgang tells his version of the history of the Wagner family.

------------------------------

Subject: VIII. Wagnerism and Wagnerites

Wagnerism was a phenomenon of the decades following Wagner's death. It
took significantly different forms in different countries.

%T Wagner and Russia
%A Rosamund Bartlett
%D 1994
%C Cambridge UK
%I Cambridge University Press
%G ISBN 0 5214 4071 8
%S Cambridge Studies in Russian Literature
%X Describes influence of Wagner on nineteenth- and twentieth-century
Russian writers, musicians and artists. It contains a history of the
production of Wagner's works in Russia and the Soviet Union (by
directors including Meyerhold and Eisenstein), an account of Wagner's
visit to Russia in 1863, and a detailed investigation of the impact of
his music and ideas on the Russian Modernist movement. The last two
chapters explore the fate of Wagner's works after the 1917 Revolution,
when he was first hailed but then reviled, and finally rehabilitated
during the years of glasnost.

%T Wagnerism : A Protest
%A H.W.L. Hime
%D 1882
%C London
%I Kegan, Paul, Trench and Co.
%X A protest against Wagner, his works and the Wagner phenomenon, in the
wake of the Bayreuth Festivals of 1876 and 1882.
%O

%T Wagner Nights : An American History
%A Joseph Horowitz
%D 1994 and 1998
%C
%I Univ. of California Press
%G ISBN 0 5200 8394 6 hbk, ISBN 0 5202 1375 0 pbk
%X A fascinating and entertaining study of early American Wagnerism. The
central character in the book is Anton Seidl (1850-1898), who arrived in
the USA with experience from Bayreuth. Enthusiastic New York ladies
formed a Seidl Society, which supported his Wagner concerts. These
included a concert performance of substantial extracts from 'Parsifal',
although Seidl would not defy the Bayreuth monopoly by participating
in a staged performance.
%O Not to be confused with Newman's book of similar title.

%T Wagnerism in European Culture and Politics
%A David C. Large (ed)
%A William Weber (ed)
%D 1984
%C
%I Cornell University Press
%G ISBN 0 8014 9283 1
%X Wagner's influence of European and American culture, in such areas as
aesthetics, politics, theology and literature.

%T Richard Wagner and the English
%A Anne Dzamba Sessa
%D 1979
%C Madison and London
%I Associated Univ Press, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ.
%G ISBN 0 8386 2055 8
%X Examines 19th century English Wagnerism, isolating specific elements of Wagner's
appeal in the period.

------------------------------

Subject: IX. Staging Wagnerian Drama

%T Adolphe Appia : Oevres complètes
%M French
%A Adolphe Appia
%A Marie L. Bablet-Hahn (ed)
%M French
%D 1983-1992
%C Lausanne
%I L'Age d'Homme
%V 4 volumes
%X With an introduction by Denis Bablet.

%T Adolphe Appia : Essays, Scenarios and Designs
%M French
%A Adolphe Appia
%F Richard C. Beacham (ed)
%F Walther R. Volbach
%D 1989
%C Ann Arbor, Michigan
%I UMI Research Press
%G ISBN 0 8357 1945 6
%X

%T Adolphe Appia : Texts on Theatre
%M French
%A Adolphe Appia
%F Richard C. Beacham
%D 1983-1992
%C London and New York
%I Routledge
%X

%T 'The Work of Living Art' and 'Man is the Measure of all Things'
%M French
%A Adolphe Appia
%F Barnard Hewitt (ed)
%F H.D.Albright
%D 1960
%C Coral Gables, FL
%I Univ. of Miami Press
%X

%T Adolphe Appia's 'Music and the Art of the Theatre'
%T Die Musik und die Inscenierung
%T La Musique et la Mise en Scène
%M Written in French but first published in German
%A Adolphe Appia
%F Barnard Hewitt (ed)
%F Robert W. Corrigan
%F Mary Douglas Dirks
%D 1962
%C Coral Gables, FL
%I Univ. of Miami Press
%G ISBN 0 870 24306 3
%X The book in which Appia presented his theories about the staging of
Wagner's "word-tone dramas". Appia dared to criticise Wagner: while
recognising his genius as musician and poet, Appia thought Wagner to
have been limited in his concepts of staging. Appia proposed an
hierarchy of scenic elements, with the actor at the top of this
hierarchy. All inessentials were to be removed from the staging and,
since the actor was a three-dimensional creature, also the elements of
the staging should be three-dimensional with the possible exception of
the backdrop (although his ideal stage would have no back wall, just
extend away into the landscape). Appia was one of the first designers to
understand the potential of stage lighting to do more than merely
illuminate actors and painted scenery. At the end of the book are
appendices in which Appia showed how his techniques could be applied to
'Tristan und Isolde' and to the 'Ring' respectively. Appia's text is
often obscure and in the earlier chapters he deals mostly in
abstractions, which only in the later chapters become more concrete as
he supplies examples of present and future stage techniques. It can
sometimes appear that he contradicts himself. There are many
digressions, including comparisons between the German and "Latin"
spectators, artists and theatres.
%O Originally published (in German) in 1899.

%T Richard Wagner : The Stage Designs and Productions from the Premieres
to the Present
%T Richard Wagner : Die Bühnenwerke von der Uraufführing bis heute
%M German
%A Oswald Georg Bauer
%D 1983
%C New York
%I Rizzoli
%G ISBN 0 8478 0478 X
%X An illustrated survey of productions of Wagner's stage works.
J.K. Holman writes: "Bauer provides a pictorial history of all Wagner's
operas, even 'Die Feen' and 'Das Liebesverbot', and he includes a large
number of striking color and black-and-white photos and sketches of sets
and costumes. Bauer also provides an extensive background on the
staging of each opera, paying particular attention to the problems posed
by the original productions and the solutions favored by Wagner
himself."
%O With a foreword by Wolfgang Wagner. Originally published in 1982.

%T Wagner in Performance
%A Barry Millington (ed)
%A Stewart Spencer (ed)
%D 1992
%C Yale and London
%I Yale University Press
%G ISBN 0 3000 5718 0
%X A collection of essays by ten different authors. This book, addressed
to both specialists and the opera-going public, brings together a team
of acknowledged authorities from round the world to examine the
performance history and reception of Wagner's works in Europe and
America. A connected sequence of essays on conducting, singing,
production and stage design explores the nature of Wagner's demands on
his interpreters. The book raises questions about the realization of
opera on the stage: about the authority of the composer vis-a-vis the
director and the audience: about the sanctity of the text, score and
stage directions; and about the role of art itself in society. The
volume also considers the explosion in popularity of Wagner's music
dramas and their ability to assume new meanings, on stage and in
recordings, for successive generations. It looks at the debate over
vocal and conducting styles, at the origins of Bayreuth, and at the
impact of Wagner on the musical life of New York and Vienna.
Contributors include Clive Brown, David Breckbill, Patrick Carnegy,
Desmond Shawe-Taylor, Joseph Horowitz

%T The World Theatre of Wagner : A Celebration of 150 Years of Wagner Productions
%A Charles Osborne
%D 1982
%C Oxford, New York
%I Phaidon, Macmillan
%G ISBN 0 7148 2258 2; ISBN 0 0259 4050 3 hbk, ISBN 0 9439 5533 5 pbk
%X A profusely illustrated (in b&w and colour) history of productions
(from the 1830s to 1980s) of Wagner's stage works with a commentary and
biographical dictionary of the main performers, conductors, designers
and producers.
%O With a preface by Sir Colin Davis.

%T The Ring at Bayreuth : And Some Thoughts on Operatic Production
%A Victor Gollancz
%D 1966
%C London and New York
%I Victor Gollancz Ltd., E.P. Dutton & Co. Inc.
%V
%X Gollancz was less than enthusiastic about some aspects of New Bayreuth.
Replying to these criticisms in his "afterword", Wieland Wagner states that
Richard Wagner's stage directions are now only of historical interest and
therefore do not constrain the modern stage director.

------------------------------

Subject: X. Discographies

%T Tristan and Isolde on Record : A Comprehensive Discography of Wagner's
Music Drama With a Critical Introduction to the Recordings
%A Jonathan Brown
%D 2000
%C Westport, CT, and London
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 313 31489 6
%X Lists recordings of complete performances, major selections, and excerpts,
both vocal and instrumental, with excerpts identified by musical incipits.
Precise information is given on date and place of recording, record numbers,
performers, and performing groups.

%T Parsifal on Record : A Discography of Complete Recordings, Selections,
and Excerpts of Wagner's Music Drama
%A Jonathan Brown
%D 1992
%C Westport, CT, and London
%I Greenwood Publishing Group
%G ISBN 0 313 28541 1
%X Lists recordings of complete performances, major selections, and excerpts,
both vocal and instrumental, with excerpts identified by musical incipits.
Precise information is given on date and place of recording, record numbers,
performers, and performing groups.

------------------------------

Subject: XI. Comics and Wagnerian Humour

Wagnerians do not have to be serious all the time.

------------------------------
Subject: A. Comics

%T The Ring of the Nibelung
%A Roy Thomas (ed)
%A Gil Kane (art)
%A Jim Woodring (art)
%A John Costanza (art)
%D 1997
%C New York
%I Express Press
%G ISBN 0 9329 5620 3
%V 4 volumes
%X Suggested for mature readers.
%O Originally published by DC Comics.

%T Parsifal
%A P. Craig Russell (art)
%A Patrick C. Mason (ed)
%D 1977-78
%C
%I Eclipse Books
%G ISBN 0 9130 3556 4 (with 'Salome' and 'Pelleas')
%X
%O 3 parts. Originally published by Star*Reach Publications.

------------------------------
Subject: B. Novels

%T Expecting Someone Taller
%A Tom Holt
%D 1987
%C
%I ISBN 1 857 232181 3
%X All he did was run over a badger - sad, but hardly catastrophic.
It wasn't Malcolm Fisher's day, for the badger turned out to be
none other than Ingolf, last of the giants. With his dying breath,
Ingolf reluctantly handed to Malcolm the ring and the tarnhelm.

%T Flying Dutch
%A Tom Holt
%D 1991
%C
%G ISBN 0 356 20111 2 pbk., ISBN 1 857 23017 5 hbk.
%X It's amazing the problems drinking can get you into. One little
swig from the wrong bottle and you go from being an ordinary Dutch
sea-captain to an unhappy immortal, drifting around the world with
your similarly immortal crew, suffering from peculiarly whiffy side
effects. Worst of all, Richard Wagner writes an opera about you.

%T Grailblazers
%A Tom Holt
%D 1994
%C
%G ISBN 1 857 23191 0 pbk., ISBN 1 857 23192 9 hbk.
%X The Grail knights have fallen to the level of pizza delivery.
One of the principal female characters from Wagner's 'Parsifal'
is central to this tale of the Holy Grail and the wholly inept.

------------------------------

Subject: XII. Acknowledgements and Copyright

This FAQ was created by and is maintained by Derrick Everett (mimirswell
@hotmail.com). The editor would like to thank the following individuals
who have helped and contributed to this document: Joao Pedro Baptista.
The author welcomes comments and contributions, especially in the form
of abstracts or brief reviews either of any of the books listed above or
of other books on related topics.

This bibliography was compiled with the assistance of the following online
databases, whose assistance is gratefully acknowledged:

Libris: Det nationella biblioteksdatasystemet (Royal Library, Sweden)
< http://www.libris.kb.se/english/ >
Library of Congress Online Catalog (Washington DC, USA)
< http://catalog.loc.gov/ >
OPAC-97, British Library (London, UK)
< http://www.bl.uk/services/bsds/nbs/opac97.html >

This compilation copyright (C) 2000-2003 by Derrick Everett. ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED. Copyright in contributed material is the property of its
author. Permission is hereby granted for electronic distribution by non-
commercial services such as internet, provided that it is posted in its
entirety and includes this copyright statement. This document may not be
distributed for financial gain. Any other use, or any commercial use of
this document without permission is prohibited by law.