That Minna was as much sinned against as sinning will hardly be disputed by any unprejudiced reader of Mein Leben and Wagner\'s correspondence. Let us throw as rapid a glance as possible over the various stages of their union.
Wagner himself sings the praises of the earlier Minna frequently enough. The picture we first get of her is that of a pretty bourgeoise, of no great intellectual capacity, but modest, sensible and sympathetic. On the other hand, several of Wagner\'s self-revelations show him in his youth as the harum-scarum one might expect a genius of his dynamic temperament to be—not vicious, perhaps, in the style of more stupid men, but keen for pleasure, and anxious to taste every vintage that life could offer him. His early life probably differed from that of tens of thousands of highly-strung young artists only in the degree of ardour with which he pursued his will-o\'-the-wisps, and his quite abnormal imprudence in the affairs of daily life—financial affairs in particular. Throughout his career the protection, the solace, the domestic care of a woman were necessities to him. We may believe him when he says that he was the most home-loving of men; home and a devoted woman were haven and anchorage for him.[107] His longing for this haven would always be increased by the despair into which his vivacious nature, so keen for pleasure, was for ever bringing him. His early twenties were undoubtedly a very critical time for him mentally and morally. The debt-acquiring habit was already firmly rooted in him, and we get hints here and there of a certain hectic quality in his views of sex. In the Autobiographical Sketch (1842) he tells us how, under the impulse of these ideas, he dealt with Shakespeare\'s Measure for Measure in the act of metamorphosing it into his own Das Liebesverbot:
"Everything around me seemed to be in a state of ferment, and it seemed to me the most natural thing to give myself up to this fermentation. During a lovely summer\'s journey amongst the Bohemian watering places I drafted the plan of a new opera, Das Liebesverbot; I took the matter for it from Shakespeare\'s Measure for Measure, only with this difference, that I deprived it of its prevailing seriousness and cast it in the mould of Das junge Europa: free and uncloaked [offene] sensualism [Sinnlichkeit] won the victory, purely by its own strength, over Puritanical hypocrisy."[108]
In this mood even the froth of the lighter French and Italian operas became a pleasure to him:
"The fantastic dissoluteness of German student-life, after some violent excesses (nach heftiger Ausschweifung) had soon become distasteful to me: Woman had begun to be a reality for me.[109] The longing which could nowhere still itself in life found ideal nurture in the reading of Heinse\'s Ardinghello, as also the works of Heine and other members of the then \'Young-German\' school of literature. The effect of the impressions thus received found utterance in my actual life in the only way in which Nature can express herself under the pressure of the moral bigotry of our social system."[110]
His own commentary on the libretto of Das Liebesverbot is that it expressed a change in his moral nature of which he was fully conscious at the time:
"If one compares this subject with that of Die Feen, it becomes evident that there was a possibility of my developing along two diametrically opposite lines: confronting the religious (heilige) earnestness of my original sensibilities was a pert inclination to the wild frothing of the senses (zu wildem sinnlichem Ungestüme), to a defiant cheerfulness that seemed utterly at variance with the earlier mood. This becomes quite obvious to myself when I compare the musical working-out of these two operas.... The music to Das Liebesverbot had played its part in shaping both the matter and the manner; and this music was only the reflex of the influence of modern French and (as concerns the melody) even Italian opera upon my receptive faculties in their then state of violent physical excitation."
His libretto and his music were the reflection of his life:
"My path led me first of all straight to frivolity in my artistic views; this coincides with the epoch of my first practical experience as theatrical musical director. The rehearsing and conducting of the loose-jointed French operas that were then the mode, the knowingness and smartness (Protzige) of their orchestral effects, often filled me with childish delight when I could set the stuff going right and left from my conductor\'s desk. In life, which from this time consisted in the motley life of the theatre, I sought in distraction the satisfaction of an impulse which showed itself in more immediate things as sensualism (Genusssucht), and in music as a flickering, tingling unrest."[111]
Mein Leben shows him as he must have been in the Magdeburg days, ardent, passionate, variable, lacking in self-control, eager for the joys of life, and in danger of being sucked down into the maelstrom of the minor theatrical world. His own version of the outcome of all this—in the Mittheilung an meine Freunde—runs thus:
"The modern retribution for modern levity, however, soon visited me. I was in love; married in impetuous haste; under the unpleasant impressions of a moneyless home harassed myself and others; and so fell into the misery whose nature it is to bring thousands upon thousands to the ground."[112]
One may be allowed to surmise, however, that his marriage was at the time a godsend to him: it probably steadied him at a critical moment and saved him from greater spiritual damage. His picture of Minna as she appeared to him at their first meeting must be given in his own words:
"Her appearance and bearing formed the most striking contrast to all the unpleasant impressions of the theatre which I had received on this fateful morning. The young actress looked very charming and fresh: I was struck by the remarkable seemliness (Bemessenheit) and grave assurance of her movements and her behaviour, which lent an agreeable and engaging dignity to the affability of her expression."[113] Her "unaffected sobriety of character and her dainty neatness" did something to reconcile him to the vulgar and superficial theatrical world in which his lot had been cast. She was exceedingly kind to the nervous and maladif young conductor, yet all that she did for him was done "with a friendly calm and composure that had something almost motherly about it, without a suspicion of frivolity or heartlessness."[114]
After a few weeks or months of acquaintance, in which he had showed a decided liking for her society, Minna begins to be more distant with him—apparently because there is a more serious lover in the field. "I now experienced for the first time," he says, "the cares and pains of a lover\'s jealousy." For a time they are estranged; but early in 1835 they return to their former friendly footing. And now we get the first symptom of that egoism in his attitude towards her that was afterwards to be so fruitful in misfortune. Though he was not her accepted lover, he jealously objected to her receiving the attentions of other men—of whom there were plenty always dancing attendance on the pretty, engaging girl. He protests with "bitterness and quarrelsome temper" against her receiving other men\'s attentions, though he admits that "thanks to her grave and decorous behaviour, her reputation was unimpaired"; and while she remained as calm and sensible as ever, he cubbishly vents his rage in pretended dissipation, which had the effect of "filling her with the sincerest pity and anxiety" for him.
He gives a New Year\'s party to the opera company, which is evidently meant to be a lively affair, and asks Minna to it; everyone doubts whether she will come. She accepts, however, "with perfect ingenuousness." As the evening wears on and the liquor circulates—punch succeeding champagne—"all the shackles of petty conventionality were thrown off," and the conduct of the theatrical ladies and gentlemen drifted into what Wagner calls "universal amiability." One can imagine the scene.[115] Throughout it all Minna acts with a simplicity, modesty and dignity that win Wagner\'s praise.
So far she appears much the more decent and likeable human being of the two. Wagner\'s further account of her increases our respect for her:
"From that time onward my relations with Minna were of an intimately friendly kind. I do not believe that she ever felt for me an affection that came near passion—the genuine feeling of love—or indeed that she was capable of such a thing; I can only describe her feeling for me as one of heart-felt good-will, the most fervent wish for my success and well-being, the kindest sympathy and a genuine delight in my gifts, which often filled her with astonishment. All this became at last part and parcel of her ordinary existence (welches alles ihr endlich zu einer steten und beh?glichen Gewohnheit wurde)."[116]
The fact that, feeling no genuine passion for him, she should have been so kind to him as she was, and should have been willing to unite her life with his, simply increases our respect for her. To her he was simply a young wastrel of talent, who needed the care and protection of a sensible woman. She "mothered" him, as other women were destined to do in the course of his wild and wasteful life.
Then comes the—to Wagner—discreditable episode,[117] too long for narration here, that makes them avowed lovers. Still there is apparentl............