# Parsifal Lovers



## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

This forum has been of SO MUCH help in getting me "into" operas I had been struggling with, and Parsifal is next on my list to acquire, so I have to ask here: what is your favorite recording of Parsifal?


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## MAuer (Feb 6, 2011)

My DVD choice:








Several of my favorite singers: Siegfried Jerusalem, Waltraud Meier, Kurt Moll, and Bernd Weikl

As an alternative, this video from Bayreuth has a younger Jerusalem in the title role:








My CD choice, with (again) Jerusalem and Meier:


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

overall has to be Knappertsbusch 1962 The Originals edition.
best captures the spiritual aspect of the opera , excellent sound.

for a studio version my fav is Solti's.

dvd, i've only seen the Stein version and liked it alot.
the Levine is slower tempo if you prefer that.


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## DarkAngel (Aug 11, 2010)

Itullian said:


> overall has to be Knappertsbusch 1962 The Originals edition.
> best captures the spiritual aspect of the opera , excellent sound.
> 
> for a studio version my fav is Solti's.
> ...


Itullian speaks the truth for me also, Knappy CD and Stein DVD











Klingsor seems to bear a strange resemblence to that evil dude in a Flash Gordon flix....


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

Try this one in spectacular HD:










You basically can't go wrong with one that has Waltraud Meier as Kundry.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Thanks so much, everyone! I did run out and buy the Levine/Schenck Parsifal ($40 ouch ouch) and the "Kna 61" (as reviewers on Amazon termed it) and we'll have to see. First viewing is scheduled for tonight, wish me luck!


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

Parsifal is my favourite opera by quite a stretch, my favourite recording is that by Rafael Kubelik, though I fear im too late..


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Hey Emiel, 

I'm sure if I learn to love it, as I certainly INTEND to do, I'll eventually get the Kubelik. Got a list of about 6 different recordings that people swear by. Kubelik, Solti, Karajan, Knappertsbusch, and Barenboim.


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## mamascarlatti (Sep 23, 2009)

guythegreg said:


> Hey Emiel,
> 
> I'm sure if I learn to love it, as I certainly INTEND to do...


If you are successful tell me what worked. Still not there...


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Couchie said:


> Try this one in spectacular HD:


i'll second this choice for video.


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## brianwalker (Dec 9, 2011)

Seconding the Kubelik.


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## Bill H. (Dec 23, 2010)

I definitely plan on getting the Kubelik (his Meistersinger is fabulous), and one of the DVDs in future. 

But for total inclusiveness, there's still the '51 Knappertsbusch from Bayreuth to consider--this is the performance/staging that re-opened the Festival to Wagner's music after the war. Broader in approach than the '62 stereo Kna, but with Windgassen in the title role and Martha Modl in a signature role for her as Kundry (as well as a younger George London as Amfortas and the amazing Hermann Uhde as Klingsor), it is still a touchstone performance in many ways. The recording was done by the Decca team, so it's better than your usual radio-transcription quality--in fact it was already issued on LPs by the following year, as I have a 1952 Met Opera program of Parsifal that has an advertisement for this performance.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Thanks! Yes, I've got the "51 Kna" in my list - we'll see, I got a little sick last night and couldn't watch the whole thing. Not a good omen, I know ...


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

I will say, Gurnemanz does an AWFUL lot of exposition, in the first act ... on the other hand, the overture was pretty enchanting, and I do think I now understand the Wagnerian ideal of voices as "lanterns, shining over the orchestra" ... voices as part of the orchestra, an orchestra section of their own ...


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## NightHawk (Nov 3, 2011)

Knappertsbushch <sic> is often mentioned as conductor of a fine PARSIFAL, though I've never heard it. Several months ago I purchased an equally celebrated recording of the work conducted by Rafael Kubelik:

Wagner: Parsifal [Box Set]
Richard [Classical] Wagner (Composer), Rafael Kubelik (Conductor), Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (Orchestra), Sinfonie-Orchester des Bayersichen Rundfunks (Orchestra), Bernd Weikl (Performer), Franz Mazura (Performer), Marga Schiml (Performer), Yvonne Minton (Performer), Carmen Reppel (Performer), Marianne Seibel (Performer), Suzanne Sonnenschein (Performer), James King (Performer), Norbert Orth (Performer) | Format: Audio CD
4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (14 customer reviews)









I will say that this performance stands far above any others I have heard - the pacing and completeness of every act and scene is really quite marvelous, as Kubelik has done his work and puts forth a gleaming, spiritual _Parsifal_ that is very powerful. Highest recommendation.



guythegreg said:


> This forum has been of SO MUCH help in getting me "into" operas I had been struggling with, and Parsifal is next on my list to acquire, so I have to ask here: what is your favorite recording of Parsifal?


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

NightHawk said:


> I will say that this performance stands far above any others I have heard - the pacing and completeness of every act and scene is really quite marvelous, as Kubelik has done his work and puts forth a gleaming, spiritual _Parsifal_ that is very powerful. Highest recommendation.


Thanks........


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## Dakota (Jun 30, 2012)

guythegreg said:


> This forum has been of SO MUCH help in getting me "into" operas I had been struggling with, and Parsifal is next on my list to acquire, so I have to ask here: what is your favorite recording of Parsifal?


Aha! Getting ready for the next season at the Met, are we? I need to do that too so will have to start following you around.  I just gotta get through the Bard Music Festival and then devote myself to the Met 2012-13 season from mid-August on.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Dakota said:


> Aha! Getting ready for the next season at the Met, are we? I need to do that too so will have to start following you around.


Ah, ya got me. Well, if you're going to really enjoy what you hear, you've got to learn to love the opera before you go! Ah, what am I telling you for, you already' know that. Gad, it's like taking a course in organic chemistry ...

it is odd, though: if you love an opera you can forgive a performance much. What you love about it sets up touchstones inside you that you can use the performance you're seeing to remind you of, even if what you're seeing isn't the greatest.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

I remember as a teenager at school taking music classes and I thought to myself, "I don't know any Wagner". So I grabbed a box set of Parsifal from the music department library along with a vocal score and took it home. Over several sessions I listened and followed in the score. By the end I was a convert and Parsifal has remained a favourite. It is a truly beautiful work and the good thing about Wagner in general is the constant restating of the Leitmotifs which give easy anchor points to what can be an ever changing and dense musical texture.
Enjoy.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

Petwhac said:


> I remember as a teenager at school taking music classes and I thought to myself, "I don't know any Wagner". So I grabbed a box set of Parsifal from the music department library along with a vocal score and took it home. Over several sessions I listened and followed in the score. By the end I was a convert and Parsifal has remained a favourite. It is a truly beautiful work and the good thing about Wagner in general is the constant restating of the Leitmotifs which give easy anchor points to what can be an ever changing and dense musical texture.
> Enjoy.


I, a young dreamer dreamt a visage of a desert of resin from which Wagner rose and announced that I was ready. I have followed since.


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## Yashin (Jul 22, 2011)

I have 4 DVD's of this opera.

1. The old Met DVD with Meier and Jerusalem. I find it quite dull and slow to be honest.

2. The Lehnhoff DVD with Meier and Ventris. Hampson is Amfortas. I really like this version, modern and thought provoking

3. The Haitink with Ventris. Beautiful sound produced by the orchestra. Not so keen on the production.

4. The Teatro la Fenice DVD with Richard Decker and the gorgeous Doris Soffel. This stripped down production is quite nice. Orchestra does a great job.

Not sure which one i would save in a fire. Still new to this opera....find it quite hard work and have never managed to watch it in one.


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## brianwalker (Dec 9, 2011)

Yashin said:


> I have 4 DVD's of this opera.
> 
> 1. The old Met DVD with Meier and Jerusalem. I find it quite dull and slow to be honest.
> 
> ...


The Barenboim/Meier 1995 Berlin Production is brilliant and out on DVD.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Well, apparently I have become a Parsifal lover.

Thank you s o o much to Emielluciefuge, MAuer, Itullian, DarkAngel, Couchie, mamascarlatti, bigshot, brianwalker, Bill H., NightHawk and Dakota, whose suggestions and support helped so much.

It started with the suggestion that loving Parsifal is a spiritual experience. I knew from prior experience with religious fervor that it is even more addictive and affecting than opera love (trust me on this) and so that suggestion kind of perked up my ears a little bit and made me go "hmm."

Then the suggestion, early in the opera, that its basic emotional freight is in the story of an innocent criminal, who by learning compassion comes to heal the world, carried me further along. I don't think you have to be a Christian or any specific flavor of religious - or religious at all - to love that idea. It's a very attractive idea.

Now, it's kind of a bait and switch. That's NOT the basic emotional freight. Instead, the opera is a metaphorical prefiguration of the notion that Jesus will return and redeem us all (or at least, all the faithful). This is why it was (and for all I know, is) performed at Easter every year at Bayreuth. It's a very Christian opera. If you're going to be made as uncomfortable by a little preachiness as I sometimes am by nudity or simulated sex acts on screen, well, it may not be for you.

Then there was the simple notion that it's really the story of a bunch of guys who are just seeking god, and not bothering anybody else in the process, and their adventures on this journey. That's a welcome story, at least to me.

And the music is gorgeous. I watched it over three nights. I took two nights for the first act (Gurnemanz really does have an awful lot of exposition) and then a third night for acts II and III. I took my time with it. It's wonderful. (Should I mention here that I was tempted to kiss the DVD case? No, probably not.)

Waltraud Meier was amazing. Kurt Moll was amazing. (I got the James Levine DVD.) Bernd Weikl was occasionally amazing, and Siegfried Jerusalem was pretty dang good. Franz Mazura - eh. A bit harsh in the voice. But there was magic on stage. And a garden of optional clothing, filled with gorgeous ladies! So something for everyone - or at least, for everyone in my head.

Sigh. And so now I have to wonder just how bad I want ANOTHER dvd of Parsifal, and of course the Kubelik CD. lol


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

Im so happy for you! Definitely get the Kubelik recording, it was a revelation for me.

However, I disagree with your 'christian' assessment of the text. Wagner called religion the 'contemptible consolation of the weak'. Parsifal seeks to explore the moral themes which underly a large part of Christian, and also Buddhist teachings, but Wagner reached these ideas through Schopenhauer and Christianity as it exists in the phenomenal world does not enter into it. There is nothing about the 2nd coming of Jesus, but rather that each one of us should become like Jesus.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Definitely keep exploring other operas and othe versions. I have to admit that Levine is my least favorite conductor of Wagner, along with Haitink. I like a little more spark in it.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

emiellucifuge said:


> Im so happy for you! Definitely get the Kubelik recording, it was a revelation for me.
> 
> However, I disagree with your 'christian' assessment of the text. Wagner called religion the 'contemptible consolation of the weak'. Parsifal seeks to explore the moral themes which underly a large part of Christian, and also Buddhist teachings, but Wagner reached these ideas through Schopenhauer and Christianity as it exists in the phenomenal world does not enter into it. There is nothing about the 2nd coming of Jesus, but rather that each one of us should become like Jesus.


Well, I dunno ... all Parsifal's roaring about "our savior" "our redeemer" sounded awfully Christian to me. Mind you, I don't hold that Wagner believed in that, just that he used it in this work.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

bigshot said:


> Definitely keep exploring other operas and othe versions. I have to admit that Levine is my least favorite conductor of Wagner, along with Haitink. I like a little more spark in it.


No doubt I will - it was a pretty engaging experience. Spark, eh? ... hmm


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

guythegreg said:


> Well, I dunno ... all Parsifal's roaring about "our savior" "our redeemer" sounded awfully Christian to me. Mind you, I don't hold that Wagner believed in that, just that he used it in this work.


seems Christian to me too.


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## Poppin' Fresh (Oct 24, 2009)

Itullian said:


> seems Christian to me too.


Wagner's main literary sources were medieval Christian ones, hence the overt Christian symbolism. Wagner also made use of Buddhist and Hindu symbolism in his drama as well. However, he simply uses these symbols to obtain his real goal. As Michael Tanner has put it:

"[Wagner was] still convinced of the pain inherent in being alive, and of the sovereign value of the identification of one's own sufferings with those of others. It is only in terms of this ethic of compassion, founded on a metaphysic of the unity of living things, that Parsifal makes sense. As soon as one has grasped that, the apparently Christian elements in the work, which can be embarrassing or seem merely added for colour, function much more actively as constituents in a profound drama of spiritual awakening and fulfilment."


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

Just out of curiosity, are the two of you Christians yourself? (Itullian, Greg)

Wagner detested Christianity as a religion, therefore it is reasonable to assume that the message of Parsifal wont be a Christian one. Instead it is a philosophical message which he believed also lay buried deep within christian symbolism too. The libretto doesnt mention Jesus, christ or anything like that explicitly, and I dont think any mention of a 'redeemer' or 'saviour' automatically qualifies as a reference to Christ. 
I actually see the opera as having a bit of an anti-religious theme. The brotherhood of the grail (aka the church), is corrupt, wounded and dying, and it takes an outsider, an 'agnostic' to restore validity and life. This is quite in-line with the well-known comments he made in 'Religion and Art', where he made the remark that Art should restore the true meaning of mystical symbols when religions lose sight and become superficial.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

emiellucifuge said:


> Just out of curiosity, are the two of you Christians yourself? (Itullian, Greg)


With all due respect, I think I'll save my answer to THAT one until we've established relevance... not sure what it has to do with the proceedings here.



> Wagner detested Christianity as a religion, therefore it is reasonable to assume that the message of Parsifal wont be a Christian one.


Well, Wikipedia says he intended Parsifal to be a kind of cash cow for his family. Plenty of people who detest Christianity - as well as those who love it - see great potential for gain in it. I doubt I personally would use a stage entertainment to explain my deepest faiths to the world - or any other medium, for that matter. What makes you think he detested Christianity? What's the evidence? How do we know he was telling the truth there?



> I actually see the opera as having a bit of an anti-religious theme. The brotherhood of the grail (aka the church), is corrupt, wounded and dying, and it takes an outsider, an 'agnostic' to restore validity and life.


To me the opera's genius is in how it appeals to such a wide variety of beliefs. So-called "foursquare" Christians - those who cling to John 3:18 and believe the bible provides a recipe for salvation - can hate the opera because its band of believers focus on the grail (idolatry). Or they can love it by choosing as its central message the celebration of Jesus' return and the ensuing redemption. Liberals can hate it because of its ritualism and focus on dogma - or they can love it by choosing as its central message the idea that redemption is available even to those who worship in such a non-traditional way, or even (as with Parsifal himself) those who start with no dogma at all.



> Art should restore the true meaning of mystical symbols when religions lose sight and become superficial.


And you're thinking Parsifal was intended to restore the "true meaning" of the holy grail? I mean, that idea seems pretty wild; I'd be interested to hear what mystical symbols you think Wagner intended to restore the true meaning to, and what that meaning is ....


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

guythegreg said:


> To me the opera's genius is in how it appeals to such a wide variety of beliefs. So-called "foursquare" Christians - those who cling to John 3:18 and believe the bible provides a recipe for salvation - can hate the opera because its band of believers focus on the grail (idolatry). Or they can love it by choosing as its central message the celebration of Jesus' return and the ensuing redemption. Liberals can hate it because of its ritualism and focus on dogma - or they can love it by choosing as its central message the idea that redemption is available even to those who worship in such a non-traditional way, or even (as with Parsifal himself) those who start with no dogma at all.


To me, it's all of secondary importance by a very long way. It's about music, music, music and a little bit of human/emotional conflict.


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

guythegreg said:


> With all due respect, I think I'll save my answer to THAT one until we've established relevance... not sure what it has to do with the proceedings here.
> 
> Well, Wikipedia says he intended Parsifal to be a kind of cash cow for his family. Plenty of people who detest Christianity - as well as those who love it - see great potential for gain in it. I doubt I personally would use a stage entertainment to explain my deepest faiths to the world - or any other medium, for that matter. What makes you think he detested Christianity? What's the evidence? How do we know he was telling the truth there?
> 
> ...


Greg, im receiving visitors for the next week, but I promise Ill answer you properly afterwards.


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

I was in the process of writing this post when I clicked away the page accidentally, so this is my 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] attempt.

You ask some good questions, which can all be answered, I believe by an understanding of Wagner as a person. Remarkably we have documentary evidence of nearly every day of his life and a vast amount of his thoughts have been recorded. His wife recorded in minute detail the last 13 years of his life in a diary, together they also published an autobiography of his life before their marriage. Finally Wagner worked for a while as a journalist and continued to publish writing and essays his whole life. A complete list of his writings is found here: http://users.utu.fi/hansalmi/appen.html

From all of this evidence it is clear to us that Wagner did not think of art and opera as "stage entertainment" as you put it, but as a most sacred thing and that he as an artist was the important person in society. We know that he did use his operas to transmit his philosophies and that he really did hope to induce change in the world through them.

As Bryan Magee puts it in "Wagner and Philosophy":


> The young Wagner believed that the primary function of Art was to show people the true inner nature of the lives they lived… This was the highest function that _anything_ could perform, in his opinion, ….


Wagner believed in the philosophy of Schopenhauer. This is clear from his own accounts as it is from the testament of others, notably Nietszche. In the aforementioned autobiography, Wagner recounts first reading Schopenhauer:


> "The impact was extraordinary and decisive for the rest of my life."


When Nietszche first met Wagner, he wrote in a letter:


> "I had a longish conversation with him about Schopenhauer; you will understand how much I enjoyed hearing him speak of Schopenhauer with indescribable warmth, what he owed him, how he is the only philosopher who has understood the essence of music…."


Schopenhauer wrote:


> ""That the object of art, the representation of which is the aim of the artist, and the knowledge of which must therefore precede his work as its germ and source, is the Idea in Plato's sense, and never anything else; not the particular thing, the object of common apprehension, and not the concept, the object of rational thought and of science."


And particularly on music:


> "Music is thus by no means like the other arts, the copy of the Ideas, but the _copy of the will itself_, whose objectivity these Ideas are. This is why the effect of music is much more powerful and penetrating than that of the other arts, for they speak only of shadows, but it speaks of the thing itself."


So it is quite clear that art, and particularly music, wasn't something trivial but something of the highest importance to Wagner, and that in his later years he agreed with Schopenhauer's ideas on this subject. And further, that it is quite necessary to look further into his operas in order to understand them and to take the symbols quite seriously.

All the above makes it implausible to me that he would use Parsifal as a 'cash-cow', could you please quote the passage in Wikipedia?

It is obvious that there is a lot of Christian symbolism in Parsifal, and that, given the preceding paragraphs, this should be considered seriously. The strange blend of Christian, Buddhist and Brahmanistic symbolism has led to considerable misunderstandings and has been the subject of many books and essays. It wont do for me to repeat all of their arguments, but I will quote for you a few conclusions reached in these essays.

From 'Parsifal and Religion: A Christian Music Drama?' by Ulrike Kienzle, published as part of the collection; 'A Parsifal Companion'.:


> "Is Parsifal a Christian music drama? We need to answer _ no _ to this question if we wish to regard Wagner's last work as reinforcing the dogmas of the church, whether protestant of catholic. However, we can answer "yes" if we take the interwoven paths of medieval and moden mysticism seriously as components of the Christian tradition. Wagner's mysticism derives from the philosophy of Schopenhauer and in this respect is a mysticism without God."


From 'Parsifal and Christianity', by Derrick Everett:


> "Wagner's drama has a Christian (or at least, religious; and if not religious, spiritual) dimension. Firstly since, like many of Wagner's earlier operas, it is concerned with redemption and redemptive sacrifice, and secondly there is a focus on compassion and self-sacrificing love. These themes are found in other religions, of course, and appear in a Christian context only because Wagner (with a predominantly Christian audience in mind) chose (mainly) Christian symbols, which religion "would have us believe in their literal sense", with which to reveal his "deep and hidden truth". Many commentators have tried to make a coherently Christian interpretation of Parsifal and given up in despair; it is a "collection of vivid material" without coherence, concludes James Mark; the work is made inconsistent, concludes Lucy Beckett, by a tension between irreconcilable pagan and Christian elements. It must be concluded that we must look not to Christian theology but elsewhere for a coherent interpretation of Parsifal as a consistent work."


So what was Wagner's relation to Christianity? He was indubitably an atheist who did not believe in god. 
Richard Taruskin in the 'Oxford History of Western Music' writes:


> ""Of such a condition (social alienation, despairing state of the modern world) Art could never be the true expression", Wagner sneered. "Its only possible expression was Christianity," which emphasized not the free actions of free men, but only "Faith - that is to say, the confession of mankind's miserable plight, and the giving up of all attempt to escape from out this misery." Christianity, Wagner said here more explicitly than anywhere else, was the "Contemptible consolation of the weak."


It appears Wagner had a rather negative view of Christianity, but having been a Feuerbachian, he believed that there were truths expressed in all religions, that they were reflections of their creators - mankind and that we could therefore learn about ourselves. To Wagner, Christianity, Buddhism and Brahmanism shared most closely the Schopenhauerian beliefs that to exist is to suffer and that one should lead an ascetic life and behave compassionately.

Wagner opened his essay, 'Religion and Art', with the following words:


> "ONE might say that where Religion becomes artificial, it is reserved for Art to save the spirit of religion by recognising the figurative value of the mythic symbols which the former would have us believe in their literal sense, and revealing their deep and hidden truth through an ideal presentation."


It is quite clear now that Wagner was not religious, but that he believed certain religions contained certain truths in line with his Schopenhauerian philosophy. Further, it is clear that he believed that a work of art was the highest expression of truth, and that these religious truths could regain their value through art.

In light of all this it is quite obvious to me that Parsifal is not a Christian work, but rather a Schopenhauerian work which employs Christian, as well as Buddhist, symbols. Indeed Wagner had planned a Buddhist opera, Die Sieger, based on a Buddhist story. http://www.monsalvat.no/sieger.htm
Had Wagner written this opera a discussion of a similar nature would undoubtedly have taken place concerning his Buddhist beliefs. At least Wagner in this case did have a statue of the Buddha in his living room at Wahnfried, whereas his personal life shows no similar connection to Christian dogma.

Finally, perhaps my question about your faith was a bit inappropriate. I only asked out of curiosity.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Wow - you've done some work on this! I hope you don't mind if I take a little time with my response. Not sure I can hope to be as thoughtful and careful when I respond, but I'll try ...


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## mamascarlatti (Sep 23, 2009)

Greg and emiel have inspired me to make more of an effort get to like Parsifal, so I'm watching Stefan Herheim's recent Bayreuth version on YouTube and using this great/translation/commentary to help me along: http://www.monsalvat.no/trans0.htm

It's a pretty confusing production - thank goodness for the wagneroperanet guide


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

mamascarlatti said:


> Greg and emiel have inspired me to make more of an effort get to like Parsifal, so I'm watching Stefan Herheim's recent Bayreuth version on YouTube and using this great/translation/commentary to help me along: http://www.monsalvat.no/trans0.htm
> 
> It's a pretty confusing production - thank goodness for the wagneroperanet guide


Think I'll pull up a pew and have a go meself....ta!


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

belfastboy said:


> Think I'll pull up a pew and have a go meself....ta!


*Taps mamascarlatti on shoulder* excuse me, sorry to disturb, but I'm not getting the plot here! Act 1: _A forest, shadowy and impressive but not gloomy. Rocks on the ground.......? I'm just getting some chick rolling around a bed, pointing at some young kid? _Can you help? Be very grateful.....*Tiptoes away*


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## mamascarlatti (Sep 23, 2009)

belfastboy said:


> *Taps mamascarlatti on shoulder* excuse me, sorry to disturb, but I'm not getting the plot here! Act 1: _A forest, shadowy and impressive but not gloomy. Rocks on the ground.......? I'm just getting some chick rolling around a bed, pointing at some young kid? _Can you help? Be very grateful.....*Tiptoes away*


It's his mum. She died giving birth to him. Then she transforms into the woman who tries to seduce him. None of this is in the original. Stefan Herheim, who directed this, has NOT heard the dictum _"less is more"_. You should see his Eugene Onegin, complete with Soviet gymnasts, astronauts and a dancing bear.


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

mamascarlatti said:


> It's his mum. She died giving birth to him. Then she transforms into the woman who tries to seduce him. None of this is in the original. Stefan Herheim, who directed this, has NOT heard the dictum _"less is more"_. You should see his Eugene Onegin, complete with Soviet gymnasts, astronauts and a dancing bear.


I just got the Soviet gymnasts part of that comment...moving on....so what do I do? I was all geared up for this! Can you recommend any more that have the translations? Merci!


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## mamascarlatti (Sep 23, 2009)

There seems to be a straightforward version here, but I haven't seen it.

Also a concert version here.

A good DVD, if get into it and want better quality, is this (I think this might already have been recommended)


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

mamascarlatti said:


> There seems to be a straightforward version here, but I haven't seen it.
> 
> Also a concert version here.
> 
> A good DVD, if get into it and want better quality, is this (I think this might already have been recommended)


:tiphat: Most kind or you.....enjoy!


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## mamascarlatti (Sep 23, 2009)

belfastboy said:


> :tiphat: Most kind or you.....enjoy!


Pleasure!

I'm not sure if enjoy is quite the right word, more like _sit with furrowed brow wondering what the hell is going on_. Heigh-ho.


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

mamascarlatti said:


> Pleasure!
> 
> I'm not sure if enjoy is quite the right word, more like _sit with furrowed brow wondering what the hell is going on_. Heigh-ho.


Like Sherlock Holmes or Miss. Marple! lol


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

I'm not impressed from what Ive seen of that new Bayreuth production. It's already a complex opera and doesnt need all that additional garbage layered on top of it.

I recommend this one: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B006ZV6YUI/ref=mp_s_a_3?pi=52x75&qid=1344958731&sr=8-3

It's another Barenboim/Meier production. Besides the fact it's set in a bank vault and the flower maidens are CRT televisions, it's a very lucid and powerful production of the opera *Wagner* wrote.


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## MAuer (Feb 6, 2011)

belfastboy said:


> I just got the Soviet gymnasts part of that comment...moving on....so what do I do? I was all geared up for this! Can you recommend any more that have the translations? Merci!


Here is our own official Talk Classical list of recommended video recordings of our top 100 operas. _Parsifal_ is one of them.

http://www.talkclassical.com/12300-talk-classical-most-recommended.html


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## belfastboy (Aug 3, 2012)

MAuer said:


> Here is our own official Talk Classical list of recommended video recordings of our top 100 operas. _Parsifal_ is one of them.
> 
> http://www.talkclassical.com/12300-talk-classical-most-recommended.html


Excellent - my evening (and probably night) sorted.....one hears the cries of a chateauneuf du pape wanting to join me on this journey! My little friend, prepare to meet your maker!


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

mamascarlatti said:


> Greg and emiel have inspired me to make more of an effort get to like Parsifal, so I'm watching Stefan Herheim's recent Bayreuth version on YouTube


I dunno ... I'd start with Levine's version with Moll as Gurnemanz, Jerusalem as Parsifal, a young Meier as Kundry and Weikl as Amfortas ... it's just a completely traditional version with excellent singers. The one you're referencing has I think Thomas Hampson as Amfortas and he's not very good, he's in bunny rabbit mode. Amfortas I think has to give you the idea that at one time he was a good choice for king, and Hampson doesn't. Although Titurel's appearance onstage in his grave was I thought delightful and wonderful, Meier is getting up there and not quite the Kundry she was as a youth either.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

This is for Emiel. Good luck with it.

One of the thoughts I had that I mentioned to you in my private message, promising to tell you more later, was that neither of us is going to be able to prove either way that Parsifal is Christian or Parsifal is not Christian. Both are allegorical constructions, built on the foundation of the libretto, and they are certainly not the only allegorical constructions available.

Just to take a random example, I'm sure all the guys here have magic spears at their command, that if any of the ladies here would like pictures, we'd be more than happy to provide them … good for what ails you, eh? Heals the soul, you might say. Requires touch to be effective. When you throw in the plot element of the Evil Woman, whose touch destroys purity, and have your wounded who requires this service be a guy, it all gets a bit gay, but move on. (Hope I didn't ruin any images for you, there.)

So whether the libretto is Christian, or not Christian, or Freudian, or Marxist for gawd's sake, is not a question that can probably be resolved permanently and to everyone's satisfaction. The point being that it would be a mistake for either of us to get too attached to our personal interpretation. It's an opera. Oh, excuse me, a stage consecration festival play lol.

Now, I also and obviously contradictorily discovered, while thinking about this response, that it's really not possible for you to change my mind about whether Parsifal is Christian. It's rare for me to say something like that - in fact, I don't think I ever have before - but it makes your efforts kind of futile. So I do apologize for that. It's bad manners to discuss things you actually have no flexibility in. Leads people on, gets them to do work that cannot be rewarded, and so forth. But pass on.

Now, according to Lucy Beckett, author/editor of the Cambridge Opera Handbook on Parsifal (1981), it's on record that Wagner displayed annoyance in 1878 at suggestions that Parsifal and Kundry represented Christ and Mary Magdalen. I suppose you could take this as evidence that he didn't intend the work to be Christian; to me (if it's true) all it really illustrates is Wagner's titanic naivete. Or perhaps he was being (as the polite word has it) disingenuous. It's in the stage directions that she washes his feet with her hair, and he doesn't think people will take that as an image of Christ and his famous foot-washing friend? Please. Do let's try to be sensible people. The same author reports that Wagner actually included that same scene earlier in a work on the life of Jesus, that he did not complete. So he was well aware of the religious connotations of the image.

I accept that for most of his life Wagner was the most anti-Christian of the people Wagner himself knew. Nietzsche (1844 - 1900), a friend of his since 1868 (although thirty years younger than Wagner), relied philosophically on Wagner's anti-Christianity, relied on it for moral support in his own anti-faith. So much so that when Nietzsche received a copy of the libretto in 1878, he reported feeling completely betrayed. It's precisely the Christian elements in it that so revolted him. I would suppose that Nietzsche was much more of an intellectual, more skilled at separating fact from opinion, probably than you or I; if his initial reaction (and one which persisted at least until 1886, according to a new preface he penned at that time to Human, All Too Human, was to revolt at the Christianity in the libretto, well, you can hardly blame me for seeing it there too. He knew Schopenhauer's work very well, and was a philosopher himself, and presumably could tell Christianity from Schopenhauer better than either you or I or maybe anybody else ever. The point here is that the Christianity of the libretto is pretty obvious, and not just to me, but to experts.

Beckett (p. 138) adds the partial text of an 1872 Wagner letter to Ludwig, his patron, that is effusively Christian in its tone and content. He states in this letter that the making of Parsifal was given to him to uphold the truth of the Christian faith. Of course a letter to one's patron is going to respect the patron's faith; Wagner had money troubles all his life, and would be unlikely to jeopardize any incoming funds by inapropos statements of faith. Please don't think I'm suggesting Wagner was a secret Christian, or any other kind of Christian.

I bought a copy of the libretto myself, in hopes of being able to disentangle its Christian elements neatly from the rest of it, but it's not so easy. How Christian is the Holy Grail, for example? It's a myth that began as a non-Christian plot element - in some stories a magic stone, in others a magic dish - and later was given Christian elements. Said to be the goblet Christ drank from at the Last Supper, said to have been used by Joseph of Arimathea to catch the blood of Christ as he dripped from the Cross. What he wanted the blood for, you know, we can only speculate. Perfectly innocent experiments in his basement, no doubt, involving baby ducks and long strips of leather. Pass on, pass on.

Another problem with that idea is that different translations will differ in their Christianity based on the faith of the translator. You'll find God in a translation with no Gott in the original, for example. Do we have to evaluate the translation ourselves? I'm really not up to that. Then too, to do a good job I'd have to not just be an expert on Christianity, but an expert on Schopenhauer as well. I am not an expert at either, but I will do as good a job as I can on the Christianity side and see how it goes.

In order of appearance, and simultaneously evaluating centrality (that is, can the work do without it):
Holy Grail: Christian central
Give Thanks to God: religious fringe
Unclosing Wound: either or central
Only One Healer: religious fringe
Wild Woman: non-religious central
Holy Lake: religious fringe
I Wait for Him: Christian central
Durch Mitleid, Wissend: either or central
Holy Fool: religious central
Holy Beasts: religious central
Atoning for Sin: religious fringe
Holy Spear: religious central
Unholy Hands: religious fringe
Realm of Faith religious central
Angels Bring Grail Christian fringe
Blood from the Cross Christian fringe
No Impure Allowed religious fringe
Celibacy = Purity religious central
Forced Celibacy Doesn't Count	religious fringe
Sorcery non-religious central
Criminal Act by Holy Fool either or central
Holy Fool's Tale non-religious fringe
Sustenance From Grail Christian central
Grail to Guide You Christian fringe
Time Turns to Space religious fringe
Saviour Died for Us Christian fringe
Dove a Messenger of Heaven Christian fringe
Bread of Life Christian fringe
Led by the Saviour Christian fringe
Atonement for Guilt Christian fringe
Repentance Without Forgiveness	Christian central
Body and Blood in Remembrance	Christian fringe
The Lord Christian fringe
Last Supper Christian fringe
Kundry as Herodias Christian fringe
Kundry as Gundrygia non-Christian fringe
Kundry as "urteufelin" religious central
Kundry as Hoellen-Rose religious fringe
Kundry Seeks Rest either or central
Garden of Optional Clothing non-Christian central
Kundry Names Parsifal non-Christian fringe
Without Pain no Consolation dk fringe
Parsifal as Saviour Christian central
(Parsifal reports a heavenly voice imploring him to save Amfortas)
Redeemer/Savior/Lord of Grace	Christian fringe
(Parsifal addresses heaven)
Kundry Seeks Redemption Christian central
Parsifal Sent to Heal Kundry Christian central
P Asks K's Help to Find A non-Christian central
Klingsor Attacks P non-Christian central
Spear Cannot Harm P non-Christian central
Sign of the Cross vs Sorcery Christian fringe
Good Friday Christian fringe

Central:	non-Christian or non-religious: 6
either or: 4
religious: 6
Christian: 7

Fringe: non-Christian or non-religious or dk: 4
either or: 0
religious: 9
Christian: 15

By this count, 13 of the 23 central elements are either Christian or religious, and 4 more possible. Of the 28 fringe elements the vast majority are Christian or religious. So it looks like a half- or more than half-religious work, decorated with plenty of Christian fringes and doodads to give the appearance of Christian dominance.

The wikipedia quote you requested, about how Wagner wanted the opera to be a cash cow for his family, is as follows, from the article on Parsifal: "For the first twenty years of its existence, the only staged performances of Parsifal (apart from eight private performances for Ludwig II at Munich in 1884 and 1885) took place in the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, the venue for which Wagner conceived the work. Wagner had two reasons for wanting to keep Parsifal exclusively for the Bayreuth stage. Firstly, he wanted to prevent it from degenerating into 'mere amusement' for an opera-going public. Only at Bayreuth could his last work be presented in the way envisaged by him - a tradition maintained by his wife, Cosima, long after his death. Secondly, he thought that the opera would provide an income for his family after his death if Bayreuth had the monopoly on its performance."

I have no idea whether wikipedia is accurate about this, but for what it's worth, that's what the author says.

The same article reveals that Wagner could be inconsistent in his public utterances. He cheerfully reported in "Mein Leben," for example, that the whole idea for Parsifal came to him on a Good Friday morning, and then later admitted more privately that this Good Friday notion was just so much romantic balderdash. Was he using his biography to "push" Parsifal as a Christian allegory? It seems possible. Whether he intended it to be one or not, I feel certain he wasn't averse to Christians taking it so.

Beckett reports that Michael Tanner addressed Parsifal's "underlying insistence on assent to a truth outside itself." Right there is where I would pounce. I would claim that Parsifal's underlying insistence is on various truths outside itself, and they are not compatible or consistent. As art it seems pretty consistent, although one can always find holes in a plot if one tries; as philosophy, it is an agglomeration of unsystematic beliefs, and the only possible indication of a favorite that I can imagine is in repetition, volume, placement and centrality. You've reported that several commenters have failed to find coherent Christianity within it. Well, good. I don't claim its Christianity is coherent - merely that it is louder, more frequent, and more central to the plot, more important, than any other philosophy one finds there. To claim that if Christianity is not coherent it's not Christianity seems pretty ridiculous to me. The whole Scholasticism movement through the Middle Ages dedicated thousands of man-years to trying to bring the whole thing into coherence, and people are going to complain that Wagner couldn't do it in a three-hour cruise?

Now, to address your response in the light of this evidence:

"You ask some good questions, which can all be answered, I believe by an understanding of Wagner as a person."

You seem to suggest I need to examine Wagner's life in detail before I can take an opinion on this opera. If that's true, it's not going to happen. I don't plan to spend the rest of my life defending my opinion of Parsifal! In addition, the contradictions I mentioned earlier - between Wagner's anti-Christian appearance to his friends and his pro-Christian appearance to his sponsor, between his reportage of the Good Friday inspiration in his biography and his later explanation that that was fanciful hyperbole - seem to me to indicate that no such understanding is possible. One can theorize, of course, just as we here theorize about Parsifal, but no certainty can be gained. Everyone's life holds contradictions, I guess; and personally, I think if people could be truly understood they wouldn't be people, but robots.

"From all of this evidence it is clear to us that Wagner did not think of art and opera as "stage entertainment" as you put it, but as a most sacred thing and that he as an artist was the important person in society. We know that he did use his operas to transmit his philosophies and that he really did hope to induce change in the world through them."

Any time people use phrases like "it is clear to us" and "we know that" they begin to sound over-certain. More certain than is reasonable. Most things, when we're speaking of people, we don't know. We can speculate; we can produce evidence; but clarity and knowledge, I think, are rare or even possibly non-existent. I think it's rather a poor trick to introduce into evidence the entire body of Wagner's output. Use examples, as I did, or admit that you could find none.

"So it is quite clear that art, and particularly music, wasn't something trivial but something of the highest importance to Wagner, and that in his later years he agreed with Schopenhauer's ideas on this subject. And further, that it is quite necessary to look further into his operas in order to understand them and to take the symbols quite seriously. "

Once again, no, not really that clear. Any "expert" who will make a flat statement about what someone believed - I'm sorry, but we don't have pipelines into people's hearts and minds. We can report when we could find no incongruencies, and we can report when we do find incongruencies, but what people believe is not something we should be pretending to understand or report. Anyone who will make a claim of that kind is no expert.

I assume you're trying to say that since Wagner wasn't a Christian, and since his operas were everything to him, therefore Parsifal can't be a Christian opera. I will stipulate that Wagner wasn't a Christian; but he had people to support. I don't have any experience with that myself, but I've heard that it puts a heavy load on a person. Changes your priorities in ways you might have a hard time imagining. Leads you to cut corners in ways you might not have when you were free and single.

I will add that having found two incongruencies in Wagner's thoughts, in just the small amount of studying I've done, suggests that there are quite a few more that I haven't turned up. Just statistically, I'm saying, there must be more.

Now, your Ulrike Kienzle quote was interesting. She answers yes and no to the question of whether Parsifal is Christian, without really explaining her conclusions in that quote. I may have to look that up and get a little more info on that. I do note that although she claims Wagner's mysticism (whatever that is) is a mysticism without God, Parsifal is demonstrably not an opera without God. God is explicitly mentioned in it.

Your Derrick Everett quote was a little more disappointing, in that he focuses on coherence and consistency. I've posted a number of times about the improbability factor we find in most operas, and Parsifal is no exception. This is something, oddly enough, that opera has in common with religion. The improbability factor is high. Just because there's a hole in the drama - or in the dogma - doesn't mean there's no drama, and it certainly doesn't mean there's no dogma. Jesus, for example (if you take the bible seriously) evidently prayed to himself quite frequently. Something the opera also shows Parsifal doing, without making a big deal about it. Consistency isn't what we're really looking for; not in church, not in the opera house.

"It is quite clear now that Wagner was not religious, but that he believed certain religions contained certain truths in line with his Schopenhauerian philosophy. Further, it is clear that he believed that a work of art was the highest expression of truth, and that these religious truths could regain their value through art.

In light of all this it is quite obvious to me that Parsifal is not a Christian work, but rather a Schopenhauerian work which employs Christian, as well as Buddhist, symbols. Indeed Wagner had planned a Buddhist opera, Die Sieger, based on a Buddhist story. http://www.monsalvat.no/sieger.htm
Had Wagner written this opera a discussion of a similar nature would undoubtedly have taken place concerning his Buddhist beliefs. At least Wagner in this case did have a statue of the Buddha in his living room at Wahnfried, whereas his personal life shows no similar connection to Christian dogma."

I think his letter to Ludwig and his Good Friday symbolism in his biography indicates he was capable of being religious when he thought it might benefit him, and that the abundant and central Christian symbolism in the libretto (tabulated above and confirmed by Nietzsche's reaction to it) indicates that it is clearly a Christian libretto. Why an atheist would have written a Christian libretto, well, we can only speculate. But as I say, he had people to support.

Had he written a Buddhist opera it would have been much more clear that he meant it, since he didn't spend his life before the opera as an anti-Buddhist! We might be having a discussion but it wouldn't be this one.

Just as a final note, it seems a disturbing number of so-called experts have failed to find Christianity in the opera. If I were a young guy just starting out this would no doubt flabbergast me, and maybe even shake my confidence in my own conclusions. Now, however, as an older guy with a bit more experience, I would just note that so-called experts have a history of being extremely foolish, and would refer you to the Sokal hoax (there's an article in Wikipedia) for further information on that.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

My daughter and I recently watched the Levine/Meier/Moll production on DVD. I loved most of it, but my daughter got much less than she wanted out of the work because she did not know the leitmotifs. She took a class in music school on The Ring and simply adores those operas. For her the leitmotifs are essential to listening to Wagner.

I know many would argue that one doesn't need the leitmotifs to fully enjoy the operas. Still does anyone know a good source to find the Parsifal leitmotifs with audio (best would be audio and score)?


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

mmsbls said:


> My daughter and I recently watched the Levine/Meier/Moll production on DVD. I loved most of it, but my daughter got much less than she wanted out of the work because she did not know the leitmotifs. She took a class in music school on The Ring and simply adores those operas. For her the leitmotifs are essential to listening to Wagner.
> 
> I know many would argue that one doesn't need the leitmotifs to fully enjoy the operas. Still does anyone know a good source to find the Parsifal leitmotifs with audio (best would be audio and score)?


Obviously any 'list' of leitmotifs is subjective and there is much discussion as to what is an actual motif and what is derived etc...

http://monsalvat.no/motifmax.htm


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

emiellucifuge said:


> Obviously any 'list' of leitmotifs is subjective and there is much discussion as to what is an actual motif and what is derived etc...
> 
> http://monsalvat.no/motifmax.htm


Thank you. I actually don't think that site could be more perfect.


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## Poppin' Fresh (Oct 24, 2009)

With all of the speculation and analysis regarding the meaning and understanding of _Parsifal_ in this thread, I thought this would be a good place to post Michael Tanner's essay on _Parsifal_ contained in his larger, excellent essay _The Total Work of Art_ which is very much worth seeking out. It is one of the most intelligent and insightful synopses that I have ever read on _Parsifal_, and I post it in the hope that it will lead to a greater enjoyment of the opera.

Parsifal: The Refusal To Transcend

So much heavy weather has been made of _Parsifal_, not least by its creator in christening it a 'Stage Consecration Festival', which seems a wantonly bizarre piece of creative taxonomy, and in attempting to confine performances of it to Bayreuth (for which there is a good deal to be said, but not with Wagner's reasons looming largest) that it is hardly surprising that people are even more prejudiced or nervous in approaching it than in tackling the other great dramas. Among common and well-advertised grounds for viewing the work with distaste are that Wagner is exploiting Christianity for 'merely theatrical' ends, that is a morbid and unintelligible _fin de siècle_ brew of religion and sex, that it centres round an incoherent concept of redemption, and more straightforwardly that it is merely a slow-moving, anti-dramatic product of senile proxility. There are more exotic charges, such as that there is a link

between the monastic homosexuality of _Parsifal_, centred around the leadership of an intuitively inspired youth, and the not dissimilar fellowship of Ernst Röhm's troopers. Not the _Ring_ but _Parsifal_ as the Wagner work whose mythology was powerful enough to leave an indelible mark on Germany.

There is no point at this stage in cultural development in getting upset about such inanities--or insanities: though it may be worth mentioning that Hitler forbad performances of _Parsifal_ at Bayreuth after the outbreak of the Second World War, which suggests a disagreement as to its significance between him and Robert Gutman.

With so large a quanity of nonsense, delectable and otherwise, written about _Parsifal_, it is tempting to produce a new edition of Tappert's _Schimpflexicon_, devoted solely to this work. But so far as possible I shall eschew polemics and instead produce an account of _Parsifal_ which shows it at once to be a supreme dramatic masterpiece and the satisfying climax of Wagner's investigations into the central questions that had obsessed him throughout his life. The first thing to get straight and hold to firmly is that _Parsifal_ is not a religious work, except in the sense which all the greatest art is religious, the sense that Lawrence had in mind when he said, 'One has to be so terribly religious to be an artist': a true and helpful remark in many contexts, but not when it is all-important to distinguish firmly between a mass by Palestrina, the _St Matthews Passion_ of Bach, or even Beethoven's _Missa Solemnis_, on the one hand--they are relgious works in that they set parts of the liturgy or the Bible to convert or to fortify people in the Christian faith. They are not _about_ religion: which, on the other hand, _Parsifal_ is. So the fact that in Act I the knights celebrate the Eucharist is not an injunction to us to join in, but rather is there so that we can see what varied effects it has on Amfortas, Gurnemanz, the other knights, and Parsifal himself.

The fact that it is not a religious work should be obvious from the Prelude to Act I: certainly the first few bars, monodic, orchestrated with bewildering subtlety, arhythmic, and with no harmony even implied, suggest a chant; but as soon as the arpeggiated accompaniment begins, the trumpet takes the theme up to its (the trumpet's) highest range, it is clear that the long, obviously dissectable theme is going to serve psychological purposes before ritualistic ones; and the restatement of the theme in C minor, with the trumpet nearly shrieking at the F G F pinnacle, leaves no doubt that we are in for _individual_ anguish. Actually the Prelude, which is extremely easy to follow and _can_ be thought of as mere mood setting, is as startlingly original--_elementarisch_, to use Wagner's term--as anything Wagner did, even more than the Preludes to Act I of _Lohengrin_ or _Tristan_. For Wagner employs silences in a wholly novel way, and also uses blocks of orchestral sound, dramatically contrasting and imposingly hieratic, in a way that had no precedents, and from which Bruckner clearly learnt a great deal, though nothing in the Prelude reminds us of changes of organ registration in the way that Bruckner so often does. The central section of the Prelude, with its hushed strings and astonishingly bold brass statements, gives us the poles of tenderness and strength which delimit the range of virtues that the work celebrates, and, even more movingly, as the so-called Faith motive undergoes its final transformations for the time being, shows the combination of both which will only re-emerge in Parsifal's great closing benedictions. Then the gruelling last section of the Prelude, with the opening theme trying to rise and receive harmonic resolution, while the violins almost howl at its failure, and at last the resolution which caused Nietzsche to ask (but in a letter, while he retained his public facade of scorn and contempt), 'Has any painter ever depicted so sorrowful look of love as Wagner has done in the final accents of his Prelude?'

If the Prelude does 'set the scene', it is, in the first part, by taking us into a disturbed and lofty ambience; in the second part, by giving us the sense of value which we shall keep and develop as we go through the work; and in the third, by involving us in untold anguish and getting us prepared for a long wait before the release of it. There is no question of its being concerned with anything other than the 'purely human', which Wagner's ideal of music-drama had always to give pride of place to. And when the curtain rises, it is on a peaceful and simple human scene. While the pace of the music is, of course, mainly very slow, it is as always with Wagner, thanks to the sureness of his harmonic sense, whatever strange regions it may lead us into, clear that things are moving: one never gets, as one does with the much more allegro-minded Berlioz, the sense of a static tableau not contributing to a dramatic process, or the far worst impression of breathlessly running on the spot.

If Wagner's instructions to conductor, singers, producer and scene-designer are followed, our first impression must be of Nature, fresh, benign (Gurnemanz and the Esquires have spent the night out of doors), but vulnerable and deserving and needing reverence. The point is reinforced by the arrival of Amfortas on the scene; though his syncopated, exhausted-sounding motive disturbs us, initially, more than Kundry's dissonant rending cry, because of its suggestion of a chronic state scarcely to be relived, none the less in the miraculously blooming phrases surrouned by ravishing wind solos and a wonderful stillness, we have a sense of what nature can do, without an aid from 'Super-nature':

'After a night of wild pain, now the glorious morning of the wood! In the holy lake may the waters refresh me: my anguish is eased, and my niht of pain brightened.'

At every stage in Act I and III one is reminded of Debussy's famous phrase about _Parsifal_'s music being 'lit from the inside'. Certainly, as Amfortas speaks his relief, his is surrounded by a halo of beauty, but a halo that is enitrely _immanent_; and that makes my basic point about the whole wonderful work. The radiance that streams from it, as well as the sometimes frightening agonies of spirit, come from within the characters and their natural settings; only at one or two uncertain moments does Wagner betray what is unquestionably his central insight and allow something transcendant to appear, causing momentary embarrassment--the solo voice at the end of Act I, as out of place as the Heavenly Voice promising the heretics salvation at the end of Act III of _Don Carlos_; and the dove at the end of the whole work, fluttering above Parsifal's head. But even they don't matter: they only show what we know from every other supreme artist, that when Wagner has ventured in alarmingly strange regions of the soul he clutches at a reassuring banality for a moment.

What relief Amfortas can get, then, at least for the moment, comes from the waters of the lake and balsam from Arabia--exotic, but by no means transcendental. Wagner's infallible dramaturgy is displayed yet again in this first act as, having introduced us to all the characters except the redeeming and the damned ones, he launches Gurnemanz on his enthralling and heart-achingly beautiful narration: it is every bit as dramatic as it would be if the events it retails were being enacted before us, and makes all the points far more succinctly than if they _were_ presented. Sovereign economy is, as always, a hallmark of Wagner's greatness. If one tries to summarized baldly what Gurnemanz narrates, one finds that one is taking longer than he does! And his narration leads so inevitably to the poised moment of hope that the 'pure fool', sufficiently ill-defined to be unrecognized even by such a professional pure-fool spotter as Gurnemanz, should come as has been promised; instead of which we get Debussy's 'perfect idiot', as lost and ignorant as if he had strayed out of _Pelléas et Mélisande_ itself. But unlike the characters in Maeterlinck-Debussy's unhelpful drama, he is eager to get things sorted out: and his pathetic incapacity to give an answer to Gurnemanz's exasperated last question, 'Your name, then?' is a sure sign that he is in an archetypally Wagnerian identity-crisis, even if he does not yet know it. By the end of the act he does, however, know two things, both extremely painful: that his mother is dead, and that Amfortas's anguish is something that he can share. But he cannot do anything with either of these pieces of knowledge, the first retailed by Kundry and the seond experienced at first hand as Amfortas cries for mercy.

The whole act, complex as it is, is setout in such masterly orderliness by Wagner that it should not present interpretive problems; but as soon as we try to see _Parsifal_ as a 'religous work', it presents nothing else: for everything seems either irrelevant, blasphemous or banal. But seen as the most penetrating study we have of the psychopathology of religious belief in artistic terms, it is an incomparably involving experience. The peak of involvement comes in the Transformation Music, that incredible piece which needs to be reheard constantly for reminding us that however expressive one had thought art could be, Wagner can go one better. It combines, with the march-like tread and the bell motif on the one hand, the relentless counterpoint in the centre, and the threefold annihilating volleying forth of the syncopated, ultimately jagged and vehement motif of Amfortas's anguish on the other hand, some of the most extreme states of the human soul in a shatteringly brief period. By contrast with these sufferings, given verbal expression in Amfortas's great cries of 'Erbarmen!' ('Have mercy!'), we have the forthright extroversion of the knights, whose music, after their taking the bread and wine, is often felt to be inappropriately cheerful or even jaunty. But so long as it is taken with the requisite deliberation and firmness, it is a perfectly apt expression of their resolve to go out in the world and do good deeds: the Grail Brotherhood is not an enclosed, contemplative order, as their words after taking the wine make clear: 'Take of the wine,/Turn it anew/into life's fiery blood. Rejoicing in the unity/True to the brotherhood/To fight with blessed courage.' But though a chivalric order, and neither other-wordly nor comparable to Röhm's homosexual troopers, it is not perfect, and even if Amfortas had not lost the spear to Klingsor all would not have been well. There is an inherent instability in it because it is at a loss how to cope with 'the flesh', or with Kundry (not a representation of 'the eternal feminine') or with the sheer ignorance of Parsifal; complacency, over-confidence and self-righteousness characterize the order, and it is a telling touch when, early in Act I, the Third Esquire asks Kundry hostilely, 'Why do you lie there like a wild beast?' and she replies 'Aren't the beasts holy here?' Gurnemanz's narration is told from the point of view of one of the order, so that we should recognize that he is not simply a purveyor of objective facts: he has a decided slant on the knights' plight; he calls Amfortas 'all too bold', but Amfortas lost the spear in attempting to vanquish the foe, which it was clearly someone's duty to do. The knights have failed to come to terms witht their own latent sexuality, and those who have ventured forth have become Klingsor's knights, whom he loathes; both he and Kundry are pleased, in their different ways, as they see Parsifal wounding them. Wieland Wagner's famous 'Parsifal Cross', with its many misplaced ingenuities and bogus symmetries, is none the leass valuable in opposing Klingsor's Flower Maidens, who are naturally unchaste but can be redeemed, and Titurel's knights, who are unnaturally chaste and therefore corruptible.

The first and third acts areof a piece; Act II is quite different in every respect, and plunges us into Klingsor's ambience as decisively as the Preludes to Acts I and III take us into the land of the Grail. The Prelude to Act II is energetic with a vile malevolence providing its dynamism, and in the opening scene we have, in the gruesome dialogue between Klingsor and Kundry, the most powerful expression in art of the hateful bondage in which one person can be to another, and, in its presentation of Klingsor, it shows Wagner once again pregnantly presenting the loathsome complexities of evil: like Hagen, he is intent that all should bend to his will, and, also like Hagen, he sees and recognizes the good. Klingsor becomes temporarily moving as he contemplates Parsifal and says:

'Ha! How proudly he now stands on the rampart! How happily his cheeks are flushed as he gazes, childishly amazed, at the deserted garden!'

Perhaps it is Wagner's most memorable portrayal of the hellishness of being evil, and the futile capacity of the evil for recognizing the good--a crule futility, but with no suggestion that it does anything to mitigate the evil which endures it.

The long and distinguished tradition of commentators, beginning with Nietzsche, who think that Parsifal is pure solely because he does not lose his virginity to the Flower Maidens or Kundry, and therefore take the 'reiner Tor' to be synonymous with a chaste boy, fail to notice that the only reference in the whole of _Parsifal_ to chastity are in connection with Klingsor's self-castration, and that the most striking is Kundry's cruel question, followed by a derisive laugh: 'Bist du keusch?' ('Are you chaste?') which is the one point she can yet score at Klingsor's expense; and it is because he is chaste, thanks to his self-mutilation, that he has power over Kundry, because he is immune to her charms, though still plagued with longing, the Wagnerian _Furchtbare Not_. That is at least _prima facie_ evidence that an identification of 'Reinheit' with 'Keuschheit' is at best an oversimplification, more likely a fatal misunderstanding.

The scene of the Flower Maidens which follows is, in its languorous sensuality, with its outrageous key-changes, a potrayal of Nature in quite a different aspect from that of Act I, where it was restful and healing; here it (for the Flower Maidens are more properly categorized as vegetable than animal) is lulling, inducing will-lessness, indolent sensuality, an attempt to reduce man to his merely animal element--not vicious, but mindless. The lulling waltz-rhythms of "Komm, komm holder Knabe!' and the maddeningly frivolous chattering of their rivarly conveys their sub-human nature perfectly, and is vanquished by that marvellously seductive and imperious 'Parsifal! Weile!' of Kundry. As they disperse, with their final giggling moment of truthfulness: 'Du--Tor!' ('You--fool!'), Wagner embarks on the most complex, exhausting and dificult scene in any of his works. Not only are the processes of thought and feeling as expressed by the words often obscure and mystifying; the music which accompanies much of the scene makes no pretence, much of the time, to being in any way appealing. Only if insights of rare depth are being communicated can Wagner's procedure be justified--he extreme demands he makes on the spectator-listener: and there are moments when he had doubts, which we may share. And yet it is hardly surprising, since he is operating at a level so far beyond or beneath that of any previous dramatist, or artist of any kind, that the odd moment of faltering is reassuring. The one that I am thinking of in particular, and which I felt to be strange from my earliest encounters with the work, turned out gratifyingly to be a place where Wagner, Curt von Westernhagen and Raphael--and probably others--felt comment to be called for. It is the moment when Parsifal is being subjected to the fiercest spiritual blackmail which Kundry can bring to bear---hear laughter at Christ, and her consequent desire to be redeemed by one hour in Parsifal's arms. Parsifal, arguing at a remarkably sophisticated level, replies that such an hour would damn them both; what is needed to end her suffering does not come from the source from which it (the suffering) flows--that is, her desire. But this is where the going gets really rough, and Wagner told Cosima that, 'I have never gone so far: this almost goes beyond the bounds of the permissable into the didactic.' For once, that is, Wagner is unable to display, at least at this stage, his meaning; he has temporarily to lapse into telling us what it is, and the give-away is in the music, where a peculiarly banal version of the Faith motive comes in with a very 'willed' effect. For Parsifal has to explain that neither the way of desire nor the way of ascetiscism will bring salvation; and the complexities are such that, while the first alternative can be rejected by refusing Kundry's advances, the second has to be explained rather than enacted.


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## Poppin' Fresh (Oct 24, 2009)

By this stage in the proceedings, Wagner has involved his characters and his audience in a web of moral and psychological themes which could only be explored in a much fuller analysis than I can produce here. Kundry's first attempt on Parsifal, by which she brilliantly forces him to receive from her as 'love's first kiss' the dying kiss of his mother, is simultaneously a moment in which Wagner impresses on us the force of his vision with profoundly disturbing effect, as the strings rise and fall twice over extraordinarily uneasy harmonies, until Parsifal jumps up and shouts 'Amfortas! The wound!' To suppose, as Nietzsche at least pretended to, that Parsifal is rejecting sexuality as such is grotesque. It is sexuality which, for one thing, is masquerading as something quite other; and for another thing, it is sexuality divorced from any healthy connotations at all--it is, to combine the points, sheer lust pretending to be mother-love; and it is in the doubleness of the falsity that Parsifal is enabled to achieve clarity of vision, and, as von Westernhagen says, to feel with full comprehension of its significance what had been merely gruesome sensation during the Grail scene. Simultaneously, Kundry is becoming more confused: she really believes that, by seducing Parsifal, what will happens will be that, instead of robbing his of his purity, she will regain hers. She will, to put at its strongest, regain her virginity--an impossible ambition, but one which makes perfectly good psychological sense to possess or postulate. She, like most of the characters in the drama, is confused about chastity and purity; hence one reason for her desperation for most of the time she knows that to regain chastity is out of the question. And Parsifal is still a fool in that his only certain knowledge is thate must find the way back to Amfortas; Kundry becomes less and less the seductress in Klingsor's power, and more and more bent on her own salvation; but she has, as one might put it, turned up too late in the Wagnerian canon for Parsifal to save her by anything he does without her active co-operation. Already everything is pointing to the truth that constitutes the final words of the drama, chanted by the boys, youths and knights--the last words Wagner produced as art:

'Miracle of highest salvation! Redemption to the Redeemer!'

The point is that Parsifal has found what every other Wagnerian character was looking for: redemption begins at home. He cannot redeem Kundry until she has shown him the way to Amfortas, not because it is a bargain he is making with her: 'You show me the way to Amfortas, and I'll redeem you.' It is only when he as returned to the land of the Grail, and by virtue of recovering the spear has achieved the blessing of the water from the holy spring and the anointing by Gurnemanz, that he can redeem anyone else. It _is_ possible to redeem other people, but only on the basis of having redeemed oneself first: redemption being, we must always remember, a metaphor for self-knowledge, self-fulfillment. Raphael, who has once again many illuminating things to say about _Parsifal_, makes a serious mistake when he writes:

[Parsifal] actually redeems no one: he only _knows_. Others may be redeemed solely by seeing, and then pursuing, the example of Parsifal's perception of the world.

It is perfectly clear that Parsifal _does_ redeem Kundry, Amfortas and the fast-disintegrating Grail brotherhood: the final words are 'Redemption to the redeemer', not 'Redemption to the self-redeemer', though he _is_ that.

Bewildering and hard-going as Act II is, it remains not only extraordinarily interesting but also moving, for even without grasping the moral-spiritual intricacies of it, Kundry's predicaments is plain. She is in the position which for a human being is the least appealing, if he has, as Kundry oddly and movingly still does have, self-respect: she cannot initiate _any_ course of action which will purify or redeem her--she can only count on someone else's grace and mercy. The situation is not all that uncommon--Amfortas is in it too; and if the only redemption were self-redemption, these creatures would be damned, which they are not as long as they desire redemption. Wagner's astonishing maturity as a dramatist enables him to present this desperate specimen, bent on destroying the hero, and playing one card after another, yet stil retaining our sympathy for her. Her plight and Amfortas's are, in fact, strikingly similar, though he is a man prone to self-pity. Parsifal, through Kundry's kiss, learns the all-important _Mitleid_ ('compassion'); he actually suffers with Amfortas, and thus understands Amfortas in understanding himself. Not surprisingly his understanding of Kundry is less complete, but he knows enough to realize where her salvation lies, and where his damnation would lie. But for complete enough knowledge he has to endure the _Wanderjahre_, or more accurately for him the _Irrejahre_ that lie ahead, desolatingly conveyed in the Prelude to Act III, which is even more _elementarisch_ than that to Act I. But that incredible piece of music, the most 'progressive' that Wagner wrote, conveys very much more; it may even be said to sum up in a uniquely concise fashion the emotional import of what has led to it: the beginning is resigned, gentle disintegration, the chromatic wanderings, and then the attempt of the Grail motif to assert itself as a pillar-like block of strength agains the dissolving forces; but that motive itself, instead of reaching its resounding goal as it has so often in Act I, becomes Kundry's motive--the Grail is powerless against lust, indeed turns hideously into it. A decade after Wagner wrote this Prelude his enemy Nietzsche wrote _The Genealogy of Morals_, with its great long third part, 'What is the Meaning of Ascetic Ideals?'. In the end, he shows himself oddly hesitant: he could have found help to answer this, as so many of his other most searching and urgent questions, if he had been patient enough to attend to _Parsifal_ instead of shrieking hoarse derision. However, Wagner has still more to say in the Prelude to Act III; for jerkily but insisently, recognizable through rhythmic distortions, the motive of the Pure Fool emerges and continues, supported by more and more powerful statements of the four consecutive notes which for the end of the first motive of the whole work, and which are especially associated with the Spear. And on that promise the turbulence exhausts itself and we are prepared for the last Act, Wagner's greatest musico-dramatic achievement, as intense as it is profound, and evidently one of the supreme utterances of the human spirit.

Once again, it is Nature that we are brought into contact with almost immediately, recovering from winter, and bringing even the aged and decrepit Gurnemanz fresh vitality, which he vainly tries to impart to Kundry. But Nature's burgeoning is all the comfort that Gurnemanz has: he, like each of the other characters in the last act, is on the verge of despair when we first encounter him. One of the reasons why the act is so moving is that, seemingly gradually, but in fact at remarkable pace, one after another of the agonies which it presents is assuaged or turned into triumph. Parsifal's arrival is a moment of extremely low vitality, his motive fragmentarily muttered in minor keys, Gurnemanz watching morosely; it is only when Parsifal has thrust the Spear into the ground and knelt before it, to the great rising and falling of unison strings, which finally move into the Spear motive, that Gurnemanz turns with growing excitement to Kundry and the beginning of the greatest of all recognitions in drama is enacted. We relive the wearisome, terrible years of both Parsifal and the Grail brotherhood before, following an explosion of self-recrimination, all the more moving for its irrationality--Parsifal is no superman--Parsifal is annointed and Gurnemanz sings the great phrase, full of solemn rejoicing and poignancy: 'Gesegnet sei, dui Reiner, durch das Reine!' ('Be blessed, you pure one, by this purity!') From then on its clear that all troubles will be resolved, and it is further proof of the total mastery Wagner had achieved in every dimension and on every level that, with the assurance therefrom comparatively early in the act, we still hang on every moment. The supreme dramatic moment, of course, is Gurnemanz's anointing of Parsifal with ointment, and as King. What follows, the so-called 'Good Friday Music', is not a chance for Wagner to extend himself lusciously over a lovely theme, but is of crucial significance. For it is as soon as Parsifal has been anointed that he notices for the first time the beauty of the meadows and flowers, no longer seductive or even, for the moment, sustaining, but simply existing, at rest and radiant. Wagner is at his most daring here, but with a cunning fully worth of Sachs he has rendered his message into terms so headily sensuous that attention is diverted from the extraordinary words of Gurnemanz:

'As you have endured the sufferings of the redeemed one, now lift the last burden from his head!'

I have no doubt that Raphael is right when he says that Parsifal, 'having now redeemed himself by insight and empathy, symbolizes a Christ who _does not have to die_, but lives.' The point about not having to die is that Wagner, like many people, is repelled by the idea of the Second Person of the Holy Trinity dying in order that the First Person should allow man into Heaven. He is impatient, in fact, with the transcendental, though as a late child of the Christian era he found it a handy mythology for expressing his own idiosyncratic, indeed epoch-making, insights. But once having got Christ down from the Cross, or rather stopped him from getting on it, Wagner reinforces his anti-transcendental redemptivist vision by directing our attention to Nature, to what, at the climax of the 'Good Friday Music', Gurnemanz refers to as 'all da blüht und bald erstirbt' ('all that lives and soon must die'). It is in _entsündigte Natur_ ('transfigured Nature') that Parsifal will find what he has been looking for _beyond_ Nature; for when Gurnemanz tells Parsifal that it is Good Friday, Parsifal breaks out into bitter lament, but is corrected with ineffable gentleness, and Gurnemanz stresses that 'All creatures now rejoice', because--and here the point is made again:

'No more can (Nature) see Him Himself on the Cross: it looks up to redeemed mankind.'

Wagner achieves here there most remarkable balance; while Nature has never been painted in more exquisite colours, it is none the less no longer, in its unconscious lovliness, a temptation: it looks up to man who, in transcending Nature, has no need to transcend himself. And as the beauty of the scene plays itself out, Wagner produces perhaps the most lovely and tender moment of all: as opposed to the kiss of Act II, which precipitated Parsifal's crisis of consciousness, he now gently kisses Kundry's forehead, completing his relationship with her, so that she only has to attend to the return of the Spear to the Grail before she can sleep at last and forever.

The rest of the drama, powerful, tragic and finally calmly ecstatic, is straightforward enough, and there is no need for further commentary, except to say that, with his magnificent 'Nur eine Waffe taugt--' ('Only one weapon serves') Parsifal is signing music which combines an intensity of purity with experience that is elsewhere achieved, I think, only in the slow movement of Beethoven's last quartet, Op. 135, and in the final union of Pamina and Tamino in _Die Zauberflöte_.

I hope that in the light of this brief account of the work, it won't be necessary to argue in detail with starkly opposed views of it, especially ones which see it as a total _bouleversement_ on Wagner's part: on the contrary, it was his _summum_, the work in which he came as near as possible to providing answers to those torturing and hydra-headed questions which by their nature can't have answers of a pat, formulable kind. Actually, in his other works he had investigated issues that he doesn't so much as touch on in _Parsifal_; but the greatest problem of erotic love _versus_ asceticism has received here a development both decisive and surprising. So much is surprising about _Parsifal_--it is one of the most original works of art ever created--that it's not altogether surprsing that it should have been so thorougly misunderstood, even if the grossness of the misunderstandings is perplexing. The only one I am at all concerned to combat here is that _Parsifal_ is 'decadent' and 'morbid'. The atmosphere of the work is often unhealthy _in the sense that_ the atmosphere in a hospital is unhealthy, and in no other way. Thomas Mann, always thrilled by the equivocal, the suspect and so forth, remarks:

Take the list of characters in _Parsifal_: what a set! One offensive and advanced degenerate after another! A self-castrated magician; a desperate double personality, composed of Circe and a repentant Magdalene, with cataleptic transitions stages; a lovesick high-priest, awaiting the redemption that is to come to him in the person of a chaste youth; the youth himself 'pure fool' and redeemer, in his way also an extremely rare specimen.

That is a reasonably accurate account of the leading characters, so far as it goes, but the intention behind it is clear: it is to get us to share Mann's view of the work as 'languorously sclerotic', gorgeously over-ripe, fascinating by virtue of its unhealthiness. He is merely reacting positively to what he sees as the same phenomenon as Nietzsche, where in _Der Fall Wagner_ he exclaims: 'Indeed, transposed into hugeness, Wagner does not seem to have been interested in any problems except those which now preoccupy the little decadents of Paris. Always five steps from the hospital.' One resists yet again a _tu quoque_, just as one fleetingly recalls, reading the Mann passage, that he chose as the location for his diagnosis of modern life a sanatorium. Of course, one finds such people in a hospital: and Wagner, Nietzsche and Mann all agreed in thinking the modern world a sick place. The whole question is about the attitude which is taken up towards the sickness, or many sicknesses, that the artist discerns. And there can be no doubt that Wagner's urgent desire in _Parsifal_ is to find a treatment of the most efficacious kind; there is even less ground for attributing to him than to Nietzsche a fascination with sickness, decadence and depravity for their own sakes, and very much less than in the case of Mann, who would have suffocated in clear air. Nietzsche's charge is all the more strange since he spent all his adult sane life preoccupied with the 'patient', i.e. modern civilization in its decline. But by the time he wrote _Der Fall Wagner_ he was so exhausted with his own non-artistic attempts at diagnosis and prescription that he looked to art as a relaxation, a refreshment--and found _Carmen_. Not that any music person has anything but admiration for that work, but it's odd that Nietzsche should not have felt that Don José has _his_ problems, and so does even Carmen herself. But we don't feel that they matter so much as the problems of Amfortas and Kundry; and that was, for Nietzsche, a relief. Even so the grounds for accusation of Wagner remain strange--at least, _these_ grounds. What is true, and may account for Nietzsche's frantic search for plausible criticisms, is that _Parsifal_ is an extraordinarily taxing and shattering experience, not to be undertaken lightly. Those who, having heard it or some of it once or twice, withdraw from it on grounds of its 'religiosity' or morbidity, might ask themselves whether what they really object to is not simply the extreme demands it makes on them--demands, they may feel, which are in excess of any that art should ever make. Hence the tendency to recategorize it as 'ritual', and then conclude that it is bogus.

If my quotations from Erich Heller about the _religio intransitiva_ of Nietzsche and Rilke are correct, then it is they rather than Wagner who are getting art or psuedo-art (_Zarathustra_) to do the work of religion; on the contrary, _Parsifal_ demonstrates how in detranscendentalizing Christianity it is possible to find value in a world not created and goverend by incomprehensible Goodness and Power.

A last point about _Parsifal_: in the greatest art there has alwasy been transmitted a sense of some fundamental inscrutability, and it has normally been attributed to Fate, or God, or the gods, or to something external to man. And tragedy, where inscrutability tends to be given its head, has often been thought to be the expression of some final element of the ineffable at the heart of things: we are condemned always to remain in darkness about what matters most. But increasingly in the modern age, with the collapse of Christianity and the rise of the novel and of music-drama, inscrutability has been relocated as being in the heart of man. Going with that relocation is the faint hope that we might finally become less opaque to ourselves and to each other. One way in which that could happen would be by understanding better the art of Wagner, and above all of _Parsifal_.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Hmm. Well, I admit I didn't read all of the article; there was so much foolishness early on that it seemed pointless. His contention that the music alone proves Parsifal is not a Christian work was I suppose what struck me most forcefully in that line. And he's not here to defend his conclusions, of course, and if he were I doubt he would deign to contend with me. Once again, for those who doubt that so-called experts can exhibit enormous foolishness, I refer them to the Sokal hoax; for those who cannot see Christianity for themselves, I refer them to Nietzsche's conclusions about the work. Nietzsche, as I said before, could certainly tell Christianity from Schopenhauerism, as he was well acquainted with both.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

It is plainly Christian, but apocryphal to the protestant/catholic traditions. For all those who find a Christian message there will be others who find it blasphemous, and no amount of obfuscated literary criticism will change that.


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

What are the main 'characteristics' of Christian thought? :

1. There is an omniscient and omnipotent god.
2. This god created the earth
3. He sent his son to earth in order to redeem our sins.
4. This son, Jesus, taught a message of love and forgiveness
5. He was then crucified in order to redeem our sins.
6. There is a holy trinity
7. There will be a day of judgement
8. In the after life you will be judged and sent to heaven or hell.


This is a quickly drawn list but I think it covers the main points.

Now if we look at Parsifal, we can also try to summarize the main themes:

1. Giving in to your will or in to temptation is a 'sin' and causes suffering. (Amfortas)
2. Compassion based on direct experience or emotion can alleviate this suffering and redeem. (Parsifal)
3. 'Erlosung dem Erloser'. Being compassionate also redeems oneself. (again Parsifal) 
4. Lack of compassion causes endless suffering. (Kundry)

We can also try summarising Schopenhauer's (and Wagner's) beliefs:

1. The world is an illusory representation of the numinous 'Will'
2. This irrational will manifests itself in an endless cycle of desires
3. One should resist ones will in order to stop suffering
4. In the phenomenal world we experience an illusory 'individuation', which causes suffering and violence
5. This should be overcome by acting compassionately (and in a sense becoming one), with other beings.

And how about Buddhism while we are at it:

1. The world is an illusion which repeats itself
2. The world is full of suffering
3. To overcome this, one should renounce the world and its desires, and try to see it for what it is.
4. Thus one can achieve Nirvana





It is astonishingly clear to me that Parsifal is not a Christian work. Yes, I will not deny at all that on first viewing it seems to draw a lot of parallels to Christianity, but there are simply too many contradictions with Christian thought and too many of the 'essential pillars' of Christianity are not involved at all. 

We dont claim that Der Ring is a Pagan work at all. We easily recognise that Pagan elements come from the source texts and that they are just a surface phenomenon. Almost everyone agrees that the Ring is a work about power and love. In the same way Parsifal is a work about compassion and the will which uses Christian sources.

Guythegreg, I would love for you to quote some of Nietzsches thoughts on Parsifal that you continually reference and then I can try to address those.


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## Poppin' Fresh (Oct 24, 2009)

Very well put. No one is denying that _Parsifal_ has its Christian elements, nor that it has overt Christian symbolism. But by labeling it a Christian work we miss out on so much of the message and the insights Wagner was trying to get across that exist beneath that surface. Again, if we investigate Wagner's all important words: "When religion becomes artificial, art has a duty to rescue it, by demonstrating that the mythical symbols which religion would have us believe literally true are only figurative, and by revealing, through idealized representations of those symbols, the profound truths they conceal" we can begin to get to the heart of the matter. As Tanner points out, _Parsifal_ not so much Christian as _about_ Christianity.

Outside of Wagner's own thoughts on the subject, all one has to do is trace Wagner's themes throughout each of his mature dramas to discover that while settings may be different, and the myths drawn from widely disparate sources, his preoccupations remained the same. Tristan and Isolde are also seeking redemption, as is the Dutchman, Wotan, etc. Wagner continuously expresses man's striving toward a synthesis of human experience in his dramas. Yet only _Parsifal_ and _Tannhäuser_ are interpreted as Christian works. And Wagner came right out and dismissed "those critics who insist on reading into my _Tannhäuser_ a specifically Christian meaning, and a pietistic one at that."

I also have to defend the Tanner article to some degree. I don't find it foolish at all. It is astonishingly thorough, providing a cohesive analysis by demonstrating how music and text work together to make the work's meaning clear. I don't agree with every point that he makes, but it is very thoughtful and very much worth reading through to the end.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Couchie said:


> It is plainly Christian, but apocryphal to the protestant/catholic traditions. For all those who find a Christian message there will be others who find it blasphemous, and no amount of obfuscated literary criticism will change that.


Right, exactly. Its Christianity doesn't follow any recognized formalism, and as such will be blasphemous to some.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

emiellucifuge said:


> It is astonishingly clear to me that Parsifal is not a Christian work. Yes, I will not deny at all that on first viewing it seems to draw a lot of parallels to Christianity, but there are simply too many contradictions with Christian thought and too many of the 'essential pillars' of Christianity are not involved at all.


Ah, thank you, yes, specific arguments that make sense (whether or not they're valid). Let me work on this and get back to you.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Poppin' Fresh said:


> I also have to defend the Tanner article to some degree. I don't find it foolish at all. It is astonishingly thorough, providing a cohesive analysis by demonstrating how music and text work together to make the work's meaning clear. I don't agree with every point that he makes, but it is very thoughtful and very much worth reading through to the end.


I'm still working on my response to Emiel, and I didn't want to leave you without an answer. I know you did some work to get the article into the thread and that's certainly worth a response. I did try the Tanner article again, still more carefully, and I'm sorry, but my new opinion is if anything worse than the original. I don't believe Tanner knows how to be sensible. I get the impression he's teaching at Cambridge and I wish it were more surprising - I've seen this kind of thing before at Harvard - but it's a little embarrassing that our (the world's) most respected institutes of higher education can't do better. Can't set a better standard so that people can see what clear thought carefully applied to an argument looks like.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

For Emiel:

One problem with any list of basic Christian beliefs is that Christians over the years have come up with many such lists for their own use. Each list excludes people who (no doubt perversely) persist in thinking of themselves as Christians too. These lists are called "confessions," and the Westminster Confession is only one example. The Westminster Confession runs to quite a few pages, so I won't reproduce it here. But such lists don't cover Christianity. That's not really what they're for. They exist to reassure worried congregants that they are the TRUE Christians, as opposed to the vile "so-called Christians" from the congregation down the block that is by sheer coincidence doing better at attracting worshippers. They're like patriotism, separating people more than they unify.

So no list can hope to include all Christians, and maybe not even most Christians. It's easy for me to imagine most Christians finding some fault with any list you or I could come up with, and saying "that doesn't apply to me." In a practical sense there's no list that defines Christianity acceptably enough for your purposes, I think. But let's accept the list provisionally, and move on.

If we were to happen on a man in the street, who was praying; and if we were to stop and listen, and hear him declaim the Lord's Prayer; what is there about it that would affirm him a Christian, by your test? Why, the prayer doesn't even mention God. It seems to imply his existence; but implication is a poor proof. How does it run?



> Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name.
> Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, in earth as it is in heaven.
> Give us this day our daily bread,
> And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us.
> ...


And yet there's no question our friend is a Christian. The prayer is (mostly) from the New Testament, and non-Christians simply have no use for it. Let's set it beside the list of Central Tenets:



> 1. There is an omniscient and omnipotent god.
> 2. This god created the earth
> 3. He sent his son to earth in order to redeem our sins.
> 4. This son, Jesus, taught a message of love and forgiveness
> ...


So. Nothing in the Lord's Prayer about omniscience or omnipotence; nothing about god; nothing about creating the earth, or sending his son to earth to redeem sins; nothing about Jesus' message, or his crucifixion; nothing about the trinity or the day of judgment; I admit heaven is mentioned but it's not explicitly a destination.

The prayer does request forgiveness from an undefined father figure, promising in turn to forgive others, and so far appears to be a cousin to item 4 on your list.

But none of your central points applies clearly and directly. Yet I doubt you would challenge the notion that our praying man is a Christian. I think the unmistakable conclusion must be that, as important as the points on your list are to Christianity, they are no guide to what is Christian and what is not. Is the Christmas tree Christian? From all accounts, it didn't start that way; some say it has now passed into the service of Mammon. How about the tradition of Sunday going to church? Nothing about that in your list, but I know it's important to some.

Your silence in regard to MY list seems to indicate you kind of agree with my designations, of what is Christian and what isn't. You disagree with my method; but to claim the Holy Grail is not Christian is too much for you. Of course, it doesn't really exist; no more do numbers or ideals. It's certainly religious, and not Moslem; Wagner explicitly linked it to Christian tradition by saying the Grail was used at the Last Brunch, and collected Jesus' blood from the cross; I don't think a serious argument can be made that it's not Christian.

And if it's Christian, and if the other items on my list bear the same scrutiny, then the most central elements of this opera are Christian, and the opera is Christian.

I do want to say something about the message of the opera, too. Some claim the opera is "about" religion; others see another message. I personally don't see a message at all. I've tried to see it as a statement about how we are all wounded, and Jesus will heal us; it doesn't quite work, and I'm not sure why. I've tried to see it as a statement about how organized religion is damaged, and will be saved by conversion to the philosophy of enlightenment through compassion, and that doesn't seem to fit either, to me. If that were the message, I think the "Our Savior! Our Redeemer!" stuff would have come first, followed by the philosophical statement at the end. That would have made it clear that Wagner was saying the philosophy he offered would heal the wounded.

Of course in that case, the opera would have been reviled by the faithful as apostasy or blasphemy or some such thing, and would have died stillborn. The faithful would have seen it as a dishonest attempt to suborn their faith to a false god. Remember one of the first things I said about it was that the promise was a "bait-and-switch." He promised philosophy and delivered religion. Since Wagner wasn't fooling with my most basic faith, it didn't bother me. If he had promised religion and delivered philosophy, it would have bothered people. He was too good a dramatist, too in tune with what people want, to do that.

There's no message here; it's a simple stage prefiguration of the second coming, meant to allow Christians to celebrate Easter a little sneakily, out at a show instead of in church where they ought to be, without being too dramatic about it.

Now, where Nietzsche is concerned, this whole process of loading experts up into cannons and firing them off at one another (like circus clowns with Boston creme pies, hoping something will stick), seems intellectually low class. It's embarrassing. If you can't make an argument yourself, find an expert who will! And don't pay too much attention to whether or not the expert is inclined to make an argument carefully and with respect for her audience. I was hoping that people like those here, who seem so disinclined to challenge experts, would be awed by the introduction of the great god Nietzsche, and have no more to say. But oh well.

What follows is from the work I cited earlier, Lucy Beckett's Cambridge Opera Handbook on Parsifal, pages 113-114:



> "It was precisely because he [Nietzsche] regarded Parsifal as the crystallization of all that was most degenerate and enfeebling in the world in which he lived that he seized upon it as the vindication of his own revulsion against Wagner.
> For years of his youth Nietzsche had venerated Wagner as the only living great creative figure, and loved him as the father he had lost in childhood. By 1876 and the first Bayreuth festival, growing adulation of Wagner by the German bourgeoisie he despised, and a complicated personal resentment compounded with his own adoration of Cosima, was turning Nietzsche against his hero. In October 1877 he could still write to Cosima: 'The glories Parsifal promises us can comfort us in all the matters where we need comfort.' [20] At this point he knew only the 1865 prose sketch. By January 1878, when he received the full text from Wagner, he had already nearly finished Human, All Too Human, the book in which he rounded on his old friend with bitter and largely accurate attacks on Wagner's thirst for admiration, Cosima's self-sacrifice in the cause of her husband's egotism, and the unhealthy sycophancy surrounding them. The text of Parsifal was the last straw. Nietzsche added to his book passages such as this: 'But certainly frivolity or melancholy of whatever degree is better than romantic retreat and desertion of the flag, an approach to Christianity in any form; for in the present state of knowledge, no one can have anything at all to do with that without irredeemably besmirching his intellectual conscience.' ... in 1886 Nietzsche wrote, in a new preface to Human, All Too Human, '1876 was indeed high time to say farewell: soon after, I received the proof. Richard Wagner, apparently most triumphant, but in truth a decaying and despairing decadent, suddenly sank down, helpless and broken, before the Christian cross.' ... In the following year, in the book The Genealogy of Morals ... he begins by hoping, perhaps half-seriously, that Wagner was only exploiting the religious connotations of Parsifal: 'Is Wagner's Parsifal his secretly superior laughter at himself, the triumph of his ultimate artistic freedom, his artistic non plus ultra - Wagner able to laugh at himself? Clearly, one should wish that; for what would Parsifal amount to if intended as a serious piece? ... A curse on the senses and the spirit in a single hatred and breath? An apostasy and reversion to sickly Christian and obscurantist ideals? and in the end even a self-abnegation, a self-crossing out on the part of an artist who had previously aimed at the very opposite of this ... for Parsifal is a work of perfidy, of vindictiveness ...' "


So for what it's worth there you have it, Nietzsche's condemnation of Parsifal as a sickly, Christian work. Let me know what you think ...


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## DarkAngel (Aug 11, 2010)

emiellucifuge said:


> Just out of curiosity, are the two of you Christians yourself? (Itullian, Greg)
> 
> Wagner detested Christianity as a religion, therefore it is reasonable to assume that the message of Parsifal wont be a Christian one. Instead it is a philosophical message which he believed also lay buried deep within christian symbolism too. The libretto doesnt mention Jesus, christ or anything like that explicitly, and I dont think any mention of a 'redeemer' or 'saviour' automatically qualifies as a reference to Christ.
> 
> I actually see the opera as having a bit of an anti-religious theme.* The brotherhood of the grail (aka the church), is corrupt, wounded and dying, and it takes an outsider, an 'agnostic' to restore validity and life*. This is quite in-line with the well-known comments he made in 'Religion and Art', where he made the remark that Art should restore the true meaning of mystical symbols when religions lose sight and become superficial.


That is always my take on Parsifal also, it is critical of dogmatic superficial rituals/symbols of religion that can blind followers to a more basic universal striving for better life common good ideals for all men......it take an outsider one completely free of religious doctrine (the perfect fool Parsifal) to show the values of a more universal view

The varied collection of religious symbols and references in Parsifal are used to make the more general point above


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

DarkAngel said:


> it is critical of dogmatic superficial rituals/symbols of religion


Well, but Parsifal's return didn't replace the ritual - he inherited it, became the new leader of the band. Once he took over, he conducted the ritual, the ritual didn't go away. If he had returned without the spear, and told the brethren that the word from God was that they had to smash the Grail in order to progress, and that the spear was anti-Christian ... then, yeah, the message would have been anti-symbolic, anti-ritual.



> it take an outsider one completely free of religious doctrine (the perfect fool Parsifal) to show the values of a more universal view


He started out free of religious doctrine - but the invisble hand of God led him to accept it - consecration at the sacred pool, acknowledgment of the power of Good Friday (suggested by Gurnemanz), and (finally) establishment as the one who will conduct the (presumably) identical Grail ritual that sustains them all.


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## DarkAngel (Aug 11, 2010)

guythegreg said:


> Well, but Parsifal's return didn't replace the ritual - he inherited it, became the new leader of the band. Once he took over, he conducted the ritual, the ritual didn't go away. If he had returned without the spear, and told the brethren that the word from God was that they had to smash the Grail in order to progress, and that the spear was anti-Christian ... then, yeah, the message would have been anti-symbolic, anti-ritual.
> 
> He started out free of religious doctrine - but the invisble hand of God led him to accept it - consecration at the sacred pool, acknowledgment of the power of Good Friday (suggested by Gurnemanz), and (finally) establishment as the one who will conduct the (presumably) identical Grail ritual that sustains them all.


Yes I understand exactly your points taken literally......

I don't view Parsifal as a person converted to Christianity to continue the same same status quo of the Grail Knights whose order was in decline and lost in direction.

Parsifal "represents" and an expanded understanding of universal ideals (especially compassion) not restricted by religious doctrines and ceremonies, Amfortas is not really physically healed by a magical spear but it is a symbolic pychological wound dissolved by enlightenment from Parsifal as to the universal condition of man and hardships we all accept yet look beyond to higher ideals etc.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

DarkAngel said:


> Yes I understand exactly your points taken literally......
> 
> I don't view Parsifal as a person converted to Christianity to continue the same same status quo of the Grail Knights whose order was in decline and lost in direction.
> 
> Parsifal "represents" and an expanded understanding of universal ideals (especially compassion) not restricted by religious doctrines and ceremonies, Amfortas is not really physically healed by a magical spear but it is a symbolic pychological wound dissolved by enlightenment from Parsifal as to the universal condition of man and hardships we all accept yet look beyond to higher ideals etc.


Well, as I said in one of my earlier posts, neither of us is going to be able to prove our point beyond doubt, they're both interpretations. I don't think any less of you for sticking with your ideas, and I hope you don't think any less of me for sticking with mine!


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## DarkAngel (Aug 11, 2010)

guythegreg said:


> Well, as I said in one of my earlier posts, neither of us is going to be able to prove our point beyond doubt, they're both interpretations. I don't think any less of you for sticking with your ideas, and I hope you don't think any less of me for sticking with mine!


I maybe completely wrong.....

Part of my reasoning has to do with Wagner's known philosophical views which would seem to indicate a more universal view of human ideals and the ironic use of "perfect fool" to become new king of the Grail Knights, so I am making certain assumptions beyond the actual literal story line......:angel:


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Bump the thread ...

Had an interesting experience with Parsifal, I was wondering if anyone here had experienced anything similar with any opera.

I've said quite a few things about access since I started here, it's one of my main concerns. I'd like to broaden my love of opera and get access to more and more different operas. And one of the operas I was successful with was Parsifal. I had never been a Wagner lover, in spite of multiple efforts, but apparently all it took, for me, was watching just the right DVD, the James Levine/Siegfried Jerusalem/Kurt Moll/Waltraud Meier DVD. I watched it, it was great, I was in. I bought the Knappertsbusch 1961 CD, listened to that and loved it.

Then I got kind of sidetracked. I had struggled for a long time with Trovatore, and finally got access to that, and actually got kind of addicted. Not day and night, but pretty much daily, with a little Traviata now and then for flavor. Then at some point I realized, hey, I haven't listened to Parsifal for a while, wasn't it great, gotta do that again. Slipped in the Kna 61 and it was awful. Ow. A tuneless, meandering mess. What happened? I didn't lose track of the action, I could follow what was happening by hearing the music - but it just didn't work for me any more.

Well, I went back to the Levine DVD, watched half of it and was back in. Looking forward to this spring's Parsifal with great anticipation. But it's weird. It was so easy to "pop in" to the opera, after watching the right performance ... but then I didn't reinforce it enough I guess, and "popped out" again just as easily.

It also occurred to me that one of the greatest parts of the drama, in Parsifal, is the variety of wounding that Wagner portrays. Kundry - wounded at birth. Gurnemanz - through no fault of his own, by others' actions that have damaged his community. Amfortas - twice wounded, once physically and once by the guilt and shame of having failed all his friends. Klingsor - self-wounded, in a futile attempt to become a better person. (There was so much about purity in the opera, when I first watched it I thought Klingsor's sin was mas******ation! (wow, you can't use that word?) Others have explained, and I don't doubt, that what's meant is he castrated himself, to try to enforce his own purity.)

But then - and I think this is one of the keys to the opera - we come to Parsifal himself. He is wounded too. But what's important isn't that he's wounded, it's the source of his wound. He has been wounded by compassion - and only by compassion. This is why the presence of children, to the compassionate, is healing - because children have not yet been wounded, and so compassion with them is a balm.

I don't think this is what Wagner meant to do. I think if he had meant it he would have said something about it; so this is kind of a subconscious result of his dramatic genius. But I think it's a wonderful message. A wonderful reminder of how things work.

I know I'm getting longwinded here, but there was something else interesting I wanted to point out. Tommasini, in his book on the 100 greatest opera recordings, says Wagner's music "points the way" to atonality. To me, I mean, I know nothing about atonality. I've heard plenty of that kind of music and almost never enjoyed it. But listening to Parsifal while I enjoy it, now, what I think it points the way to is jazz. I think Parsifal is a kind of very slow jazz, slower than any other but still very hip.


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