Speranza
In view of the speed with which it was written this Prose Draft, dated 27-30
August 1865, cannot have been the first of Wagner's outlines for Parsifal. There
is evidence that an earlier sketch was written in 1857. In his autobiography
Mein Leben, Wagner describes the April (or it might have been early May) morning
in 1857 on which he was reminded of the Good Friday passage in Wolfram's
Parzival:
Ever since that stay in Marienbad, where I had conceived Die
Meistersinger and Lohengrin, I had not taken another look at that poem; now its
ideality came to me in overwhelming form, and from the idea of Good Friday I
quickly sketched out an entire drama in three acts.
That first
sketch or scenario, which H.S. Chamberlain claimed to have read, has not
survived.
So the earliest outline known is this one, a more detailed draft made
by Wagner at the request of King Ludwig.
It appears in the Brown Book (left),
the diary and notebook, given to him by Cosima, that he used intermittently from
1865 until his death in 1883. The original has been on display at Haus Wahnfried
in Bayreuth.
Some names differ from those that appear in the final poem and
score.
At this stage in the development of the text, Wagner was still, in most
cases, using the spellings that he had found in Wolfram.
Thus, for example,
Anfortas had not yet been changed to Amfortas.
In this draft, however, he uses
the name Schmerzeleide [Pain- sorrow] instead of Wolfram's Herzeloyde
[Hearts-sorrow] for Parzival's mother.
We owe the resumption of the work
to king Ludwig: from 27 to 30 August 1865 the Parzival-poem was written down in
the earliest version known today.
The appearance of the young king, who entered
the circle of friends of Wagner's Parzival [as the drama and its central
character were called at this stage], gave life and warmth to the form of
Wolfram's poem.
Now there was a kind of reconciliation between Amfortas-Tristan
[who had begun to dominate the developing scenario] and the young prince, who
moved into the center of the action.
Wagner was still in a state of shock
following the sudden death of his first Tristan, Ludwig Schnorr von Carolsfeld,
on 21 July 1865 in Dresden.
Work on Parzival gave Wagner release from grim
reality: that was help in need are the words with which the Master concluded the
draft of Parzival. The contents of this draft match almost exactly those of the
finished drama, although it begins with background details that were provided
for the benefit of the king. These would be compressed in the drama.
["Parzival und der Grail", Wolfgang Golther, 1925]
Those who know the
music-drama will notice that there are many points in this draft that were
removed, changed or developed before the poem was completed.
Even in the copy
that Wagner made for King Ludwig the day after completing this draft, there were
already some changes and, probably while preparing the copy, Wagner made some
corrections to the original.
In particular, Wagner was uncertain about how to
deal with the bleeding spear, a mysterious element of Wolfram's story that
would, in another form, become an important element of Wagner's story.
So
although this draft does not correspond in every detail to Wagner's final
concept, it represents the outcome of his reflections on Wolfram's poem and
other medieval literature over the two preceding decades.
Act 1, A
clearing in the forest of Monsalvat
Act 2, Klingsor's castle and magic
garden
Act 3, Open meadows at the edge of the forest
Saturday, February 23, 2013
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