General Characteristics of Liszt—Earnestness of his Art—Its Genial Character—His Interest in Life—His Loving Nature—Affection for his Parents—Remorse of a Capellmeister—Richard Wagner’s Testimony—A Helping Hand in time of Need—His Generosity to Wagner—Secures him a Hearing—The Letter to Herr B.—Plans to Bring out Wagner’s Works in London—Wagner in Despair—Misunderstanding of Liszt—A Personal Appeal and Prompt Reply—A Success made in Weimar—Urges Wagner to create a New Work—“The Nibelungen”—Wagner’s Tribute at Baireuth.
BETTER known personally than most of his contemporaries, not so much by the principles of his artistic movement as by his own personality, for fifty years all over Europe, admired and courted on account of the wonderful miracle of his genius, a hundred-fold more on account of his manners and individuality studied partly for the laudable purpose of discovering the secret of his overwhelming mastery, partly to detect the failings of human weakness, the shadow in so much light, “the dark ray”—what can be said of such a man as Liszt in a general characterization?
And yet, however well known he may be, in reality, we, his contemporaries, can know little of such a man, for the reason that we are now in a position to define the limits of his artistic power. How long is it since we shrugged our shoulders at the so-called earnest manner of Mozart when we spoke of him as a man? That he was a genius no one doubted, but with it was immediately associated the idea of a light-minded person who was only too glad to drink champagne, or of a child who did not know how to deal with life, still less with money, and consequently differed from ordinary people. And yet how his letters, already in their second edition, have revealed him to us! That this divinely inspired artist, even in his youthful years, was so imbued with the seriousness of his art, will surprise that person who only recognizes the grace of his melodies apart from any idea of human toil and does not know that they are results achieved by the hardest labor. That life was so thoroughly beautiful to him, especially in the pure and manly features of piety and friendship, was due to a lovely union of the beauty and purity of feeling which alone can disclose to us the soulfulness of his music. This could only be predicated of one, who, like Mozart, had actually taken into his soul the very essence of art. It is manifest in the great variety of his creations as well as in his correspondence, and particularly in the latter, as in his various biographies it is only disclosed piecemeal.
And yet that quality of his music which is showered down upon our spirits like heavenly peace and blessing is a something which far transcends the beautiful earnestness of a life measured by duty and brings us to a close perception of the infinite, of those conditions of life with which marvelous natural endowments and the highest perfection of intellectual and artistic skill have little to do, and in which we are forced to recognize the peculiar essence out of which genius springs and creates. This deep heavenly joy of the spirit which only seeks the good, and in such wise only as to maintain and cherish it, how and when it can, not merely to conform his habit and life to it—this genuine spirit of love which is the essence of industry, of power, and of the highest and most productive qualities, this strongest characteristic of Mozart’s nature is due to that spirit of human love which was characteristic of his South-German home. It is as good a product of his own peculiarly moral labor as his boundless knowledge is the result of his industry as an artist. The loving earnestness of a spirit which embraces all human things alone produces such creations as Pamina and Sarastro. Every tone of his tells us this, be it in his joyous songs, in the serene purpose of his life, or in the gracious promptings of his heart.
Is not Franz Liszt also a child of this Austria, and particularly so as he still possessed this natural good-heartedness in all its inner abundance, and had not yet eaten of the tree of knowledge that would drive him from the Paradise of unconscious, beautiful harmony without securing in return for it the peace of the conscious and wished-for reconciliation? His strong attachment to his parents in his youth is known to us. It is a marked characteristic of his life. The loss of his father threatened his mental condition. Friendships! How many letters have been made public which disclose his personal relations in every stage of development from pleasant acquaintanceship to the most self-sacrificing friendship of the heart, mostly with artists, that is, colleagues, even with rivals, to whom he was almost without exception superior and whom he made happy with his love. Yes, most happy! We once heard a Hofcapellmeister, who had been induced by a prominent director of an art institute, now deceased, to practice an imposition on our master, which drove him away from Weimar, the scene of his activity, declare with tears in his eyes: “How could I have acted so toward such a man? I feel it was a crime against myself rather than against him.” There was no delay between the expectation and the reception of Liszt’s benefactions. Who, especially among artists, can say that when they appealed to him he did not speedily help them? And who has not appealed to him? It has been truthfully said that no sovereign lives who has lavished his generosity upon his dominions as widely and continuously as Liszt. Vienna experienced it as well as the city where he lived. The Beethoven memorial will bear witness to it for posterity, as well as the one erected in Bonn, in 1845, and the Schiller-Goethe memorial of 1849, at Weimar, which would not have been completed but for Liszt’s generosity.
One manifestation shows us the greatness and genuineness of the artist, and its parallel can only be found in the relations of Goethe and Schiller. What does Richard Wagner, the incomparable, who stands equal in rank with Liszt in the world of art, say of the days when he had to leave his fatherland as a fugitive, the victim of infamous persecution?
It was in May, 1849. “On the day when every indication convinced me, beyond all question, that my personal situation was endangered, I saw Liszt directing a performance of my ‘Tannhauser,’ and was astonished at recognizing my second self in his rendering. What I felt when I invented this music, he felt when he conducted it. What I wanted to say when I wrote it down, he said when he clothed it in tones,” writes Wagner, speaking of his short stay in Weimar. One realizes in this event the climax of his artistic sympathy. Wagner assures us that with Liszt it sprang from that deepest fountain of life, his true manly habit and goodness; from his sympathy with actual life and its influences. He tells us how strange it was that he had in truth found his “wonderful friend.”
He had made Liszt’s acquaintance in Paris, about the year 1840, at the very time when, after repeated disappointments, “disheartened and disgusted,” he had renounced all hope of success and was in a constant state of internal revolt against the artistic conditions which he found there and which led him to a completely new career. “When we met, he struck me as an utter contrast to my own being and circumstances,” says he. “In this world, in which I had longed to appear and shine, wherein the midst of my insignificant surroundings I had yearned for the great, Liszt had grown up from his younger years to become the general delight and wonder, at a time when I had become so disgusted with it and with the coldness and lack of sympathy with which it regarded me, that I could only realize its hollowness and emptiness with all the bitterness of one repeatedly deceived.” Thus Liszt was to him at that time “scarcely more than a suspicious phenomenon,” and he had as yet no opportunity of acquainting the inspired virtuoso with his own being and working. Thus the first contact of the two artists was superficial, as might have been expected of a man like Liszt, to whom every day brought its changeable impressions, while on his own part, in his half desperate circumstances and condition, Wagner had not sufficient calmness and fairness to seek for the natural and simple causes of Liszt’s behavior toward him. He did not go to see him again, and manifested his aversion by declining to make any closer acquaintance with him. Liszt was to him as he says, “one of those beings who are strange and hostile to one’s nature.” Unprecedented and particularly impossible in a man like Liszt, it was only possible in the case of a nature like Wagner’s, which had become hard and almost repulsive through the force of circumstances. But we discover that the situation cleared itself, and it reveals to us the actual nature of Liszt himself, in all its greatness.
Wagner, in his openly vehement style, made no concealment of his feelings toward Liszt, and so it could not fail to happen that one day he heard what Wagner thought about him. It was at the time when “Rienzi” was attracting general attention at Dresden and Liszt had already settled down at Weimar as Hofcapellmeister. Liszt was astonished to find that he was so violently misunderstood by a man with whom he was scarcely acquainted, and in 1851, Wagner writes in his “Communications to my Friends” that when he looks back he is still greatly moved at the solicitude and actual persistence which Liszt displayed, and the trouble which he took to change the opinions which he entertained toward him. He had not even known anything of his works. He was urged on by the simple wish to remove this accidental want of harmony between himself and another person, and perhaps also he felt a delicate misgiving whether he himself might not have unconsciously injured him. “He who knows,” continues Wagner, “all the disputatious hardness of human life and the boundless selfishness in all our social relations, and particularly in the relations of artists to each other, must be more than astonished when he realizes how I was treated by that extraordinary man.”
But, he continues, notwithstanding all that had been done, he was yet to experience the peculiar beauty of Liszt’s gracious and loving nature in a stronger manifestation. He at last observed these approaches with actual wonder, and had been inclined to give them still less credit, now that Liszt’s circumstances had changed and he had come to be a famous man and the Royal Saxon Hofcapellmeister. Now the actual basis, the essence, so to speak, of Liszt’s manner of action and demeanor shows itself for the first time. He had seen “Rienzi,” “and,” says Wagner, “from every corner of the world, where, in the course of his artistic career he had communicated with others, I received, now through this person and now through that, evidences of the restless ardor of Liszt and of the satisfaction he had experienced in hearing my music.” This happened at the time when Wagner himself was more and more losing ground with his dramatic creations. As Liszt had now settled down quite permanently in Weimar, he made it a matter of prime importance to establish a new and fixed abode for the creations of this mistaken and proscribed artist. “Everywhere and always caring for me, always quickly and decisively helping, when help was necessary, with an open heart for my every wish, with a self-sacrificing love for my very self, Liszt was something to me which I had never found before and in a measure the fullness of which we only comprehend when it actually embraces us to its full extent.” With this most beautiful tribute, Wagner describes the circumstance which was so decisive for him—and who can recall one more beautiful?
In the following year, 1841, in contrast with his own and Wagner’s self-sacrificing natures, Liszt had publicly accused Paganini, his greatest rival, of being a “narrow egotist,” and referred to the “artistic royalty” and even to “the divine service of devotion,” which elevates genius to a priestly power—that reveals the very souls of men to their God. He closes with the significant words: “May the artist of the future with joyful heart renounce a frivolous, egotistical role, which we hope has found its last brilliant representative in Paganini! May he fix his goal in and not outside of himself and virtuosity be to him a means, not an end! May he never forget that, although it is a customary saying, ‘Noblesse oblige,’ it is a far more honorable saying, ‘Genie oblige.’”
“It must be frankly conceded that Liszt has devoted himself with the greatest enthusiasm to the laudable task of securing the appreciation of new works which are unknown or misunderstood and old works which have been forgotten, as well as of the latest works belonging to the opposition school,” says a notice of him, written in 1876. “Thus we owe to Liszt our nearer acquaintance with Berlioz, the introduction of many unknown works of Franz Schubert, Richard Wagner, Robert Schumann, Raff, Baerwald, Frank in Paris, and other masters, which secured their first public performance through him.”
There is still further evidence of this in the following letter which has only recently come to light. It was written in the year 1849, when Wagner had been compelled to be a fugitive, and was bargaining for “Lohengrin,” and is addressed to one Herr B., in Paris, but not Berlioz. “Dear B.,” it says, “Richard Wagner, Capellmeister of Dresden, has been here since yesterday. He is a man of astonishing genius, of a genie si trepantique, as befits this country, a new and brilliant appearance in art. Recent events in Dresden have forced him to a plan in the execution of which I am determined to help him with all my power. Meanwhile I have had a long interview with him. Listen to what we have planned and what must be realized from it. First, we will create a success for some grand, heroic and fascinating music, the score of which was finished a year ago. Perhaps it will be in London. Chorley, for instance, can be of great service to him in this undertaking. Then if Wagner comes, with his success in his pocket, to Paris in the winter, the doors of the opera, at which he has always been knocking, will open to him. It is unnecessary to trouble you with any further explanations. You understand and must learn whether there is at this moment an English theatre in London—for the Italian opera would be of no service to our friend, and whether there is any prospect that a great and beautiful work by a master-hand could make a success. Reply as soon as possible. Later, that is, toward the end of the month, Wagner will pass through Paris. You will see him, and he will speak with you personally about the direction and extent of his plan, and will be royally thankful for every favor. Write soon and help me as ever. It is a noble purpose for the accomplishment of which all this must be done.”
Richard Wagner himself, in confirmation of what we have said, relates the most beautiful thing of all. At the close of his brief Paris visit, in 1849, when, sick, miserable and despairing, he sat brooding over his situation, he happened to espy the score of his almost forgotten “Lohengrin.” It suddenly struck him with a sense of pity, that the music on this death-pale paper would never be heard: “I wrote two words to Liszt and he replied that extensive preparations were being made for the performance of the work. Whatever men and circumstances could accomplish there (in Weimar,) should be done. Success rewarded him and after this success he approached me and said: ‘See, thus far have we come. Now create us a new work, that we may go still further.’”
Wagner created it. It was the “Nibelungen.”
And what occurred, when in the summer of 1876, this colossal work, the glory of modern art as well as of modern culture, one might say of all the culture of the world, for every nation was represented there, was at last produced in an artistic manner worthy of it?
“Here is one who first gave me faith in my work, when no one knew anything of me,” said the artist, in the midst of a joyful company, at the close of the first performance. “But for him perhaps you would not have had a note from me to-day. It is my dear friend, Franz Liszt.”
All this shows that what he did was only the fulfillment of duty. With him, as with one of the greatest spirits of all the centuries, it was his pride to be of service in his art. The proud words apply to him who truly feels the greatness which he himself helps to create, beyond and above all else in universal service, “genie oblige.”