Category: Cosima Wagner Diaries

Disturbed night. In the morning another conference, contracts signed, cordial leave-taking from all participants. Our first lunch, very happy and gay, all in good health. I pick up this book again after a break of 10 days. Heavy on my heart lie the mortal sickness of my distant friend and…

—move into the new house! It is not yet finished, far from it, but we shall conquer. Nice lunch at the Feustels’; at 4 o’clock consecration of the dining room with a conference among Herr Hoffmann, Brandt, Brückwald, the management committee, and the Brückner brothers, scene painters from Coburg. At…

All the exertions of moving, during which I receive a terrible blow with the news of Marie Muchanoff’s mortal illness and awful pain . . . Many treasures from the rich contents of mind and heart are now lost to this book for ever, since, numbed by the shock and…

I am again confined to my bed and am now a completely useless member of the family! — I ask R. to bring me Woodstock, and he is glad that I wish to read it, saying, “I was thinking only recently that history is only enjoyable in the hands of…

R. plagued by a headache in consequence of the Thursday gathering, he cannot work and goes to the house; I cannot give him support, since, being beset by a severe cough, I have to stay at home.  In the evening R. says to me: “I believe it would not take…

Still under house arrest, and the house looking like a desert, since curtains and furniture have already been removed. R. does not work, but writes to the King’s secretary, “amiably” complaining that though a great favor has been granted him, he has received no word about it.  In the evening…