The fascination of Wagner

The cultural year 2013 was dominated by Richard Wagner's 200th birthday: festivals and productions, new biographies and documentaries. And yet not everything has been said. In this interview, Melanie Unseld talks about gender constructions and self-staging, love and partnership, opera and pop culture.

QUESTION: Ms Unseld, 200 years of Richard Wagner: many of the major opera houses have included new productions of the "Ring" in their programmes - which were sold out immediately. The feature pages are going into overdrive. What is so fascinating about Wagner?

UNSELD: Firstly, it's the music. Wagner's music is extremely captivating. A look at the reception of Wagner shows that many people were and are simply enraptured by his music. In France, Richard Wagner gave rise to an entire aesthetic movement - the so-called Wagnérisme. Of course, there is also a fascination with Wagner the artist.

QUESTION: This fascination has obviously lasted for a long time. What is the current Wagner year all about? Is it just PR for new Wagner books and new productions of his works?

UNSELD: Commemorative years are always an expression of certain cultures of remembrance. They say a lot about our own cultural self-image. Which composers have the pleasure or the predicament - depending on your point of view - of being celebrated with a commemorative year? It's only a handful, and this small selection reveals a lot about us, or more precisely: our musical canon. But composers do not enter this canon without any help. Wagner was a child of the 19th century. And he was very aware that this canon was decisive for him and the afterlife of his works. Accordingly, he did a lot to get into this canon and he did a lot to stay in it, so that it is almost a matter of course for us today to celebrate his "milestone birthday".

Cosima set the course

QUESTION: How did Wagner achieve this - apart from composing?

UNSELD: He wrote a lot, not just music, but also aesthetic writings. And with Bayreuth, he created a place of activity that served exclusively for the performance of his music dramas. What other composer can boast that? And, of course, in Cosima Wagner he had a wife at his side who acted as his chronicler and later, after Wagner's death, as the one who set the course for the continuation of his works.

QUESTION: Wagner also dictated his autobiography to her.

UNSELD: Yes. A very peculiar situation: Richard Wagner dictated his own biography to his second wife Cosima. But Cosima Wagner saw herself not only as his stenographer, but above all as a chronicler. She therefore also had a say in the writing of his autobiography.

QUESTION: So she was instrumental in shaping the image we have of Wagner today?

UNSELD: Yes. We know much of what we know about Wagner from her notes, from her autobiography, but above all from her diaries. So her perspective plays a major role. And since the documents show that the two of them dealt extensively with the question of the heroisation of the artist, this was incorporated into their notes. For example, they read Thomas Carlyle again and again.

QUESTION: A British writer and essayist who was regarded as one of the pioneers of heroism in the 19th century.

UNSELD: Cosima and Richard Wagner were convinced that the image of the artistic hero could only be realised in a dual constellation: Richard Wagner as a composer of genius and Cosima Wagner as his chronicler. Both made a conscious decision to create Wagner's image in this way.

QUESTION: Wagner, the hero, the heroic artist. But his operas are not exactly lacking in heroic figures either. Are these entrenched views that you are questioning in your research?

UNSELD: Especially in this Wagner year, I want to show that there are aspects of Wagner research that have remained underexposed up to now and yet are of central importance.

Heteronormativity is becoming fragile

QUESTION: Gender research in musicology has hardly dealt with Wagner?

UNSELD: Wagner has received comparatively little attention there. This raises the question of why. Is Wagner too obvious an object of research, because he is constantly being thought about as "the woman" and "the hero"? Or are there other reasons? Wagner lived in a time in which a strong gender dichotomy was postulated, a heteronormativity that seems to be clearly reflected in the female-hero scheme. He himself has thought and written a great deal about gender and gender relations. But the unambiguities of heteronormativity become fragile in many places: both in his theoretical writings and in his stage works. It is worth taking a closer look. In addition, Wagner's reception also clung to these dichotomies for a long time, without differentiation. So here, too, it's worth taking a closer look.

QUESTION: Let's illustrate this with a concrete example. On the one hand, we have Siegfried, the radiant male hero...

UNSELD: ... his portrayal as a male hero is indeed predominant - how often have we seen Siegfried in a bearskin! The New York Metropolitan Opera, for example, is showing an exhibition with pictures of its Wagner productions at the beginning of the 20th century: an almost immeasurable collection of bearskins, horn helmets and spears. What is exciting, however, is that the exhibition illustrates staging patterns that, on the one hand, are still strongly reminiscent of productions during Wagner's lifetime. On the other hand, it visually reinforces the idea of the dichotomy between man and woman at a time when women were taking to the streets for their right to vote. It is also interesting to note that while the stagings clarify heteronormativity, frictions of this model can be found in the score, in the texts and in Wagner's writings. There are also many questions about the concept of "hero" peeking out from behind the bearskin.

QUESTION: Is "Tristan and Isolde" a good example of this? The fascinating thing about "Tristan" is that Wagner rethinks the concept of "couple" in a completely different way.

UNSELD: There is initially a triangular constellation that creates drama. Basically, however, there are two different couple concepts: the legitimate couple - the married couple of King Marke and Isolde - and the "real" couple - Tristan and Isolde. Despite everything that is important for the long motif tradition of the medieval material, this seems to me to have been the aspect that was so appealing to Wagner. Because we have to bear in mind that the dominant couple concept at the time "Tristan" was written was the bourgeois marriage. Breaking out of the marriage, questioning it - as Tristan and Isolde do - points to a "sore point" in society. In this respect, Wagner's "Tristan" puts marriage as a concept up for discussion. The fact that he then only finds utopia as a space for Tristan and Isolde's love is another exciting aspect.

Elsa is the "original woman" for Wagner

QUESTION: And in contrast to this is the opera "Lohengrin" with the character of Elsa, whom Wagner sees as the prototype of the feminine.

UNSELD: Elsa is the "original woman" for Wagner - that's how he described her. This "primal woman" is dependent on redemption by the radiant knight. This moment of the hero's redemption by the woman is central to Wagner.

QUESTION: But Wagner also thematises the principle of partnership there - similar to "Tristan".

UNSELD: Wagner does use the same model. Only in "Lohengrin" it works differently: if Elsa hadn't asked Lohengrin who he is, where he comes from, then it would have worked out with the two of them and they would have married...

QUESTION: So "Lohengrin" is also about the failure of a bourgeois idea of marriage and partnership?

UNSELD: Yes, but in a form that is more strongly committed to the gender dichotomy of the 19th century. Remember: Lohengrin is the bearer of a secret. Elsa must not ask about it. She must remain ignorant. If she knew his secret, if she knew his true identity, then this would be a kind of moving up to eye level for her: and bourgeois marriage in the 19th century was anything but a concept at eye level. It was a very clear model of dependency. Emotionally, legally and socially. And this relationship of dependency is challenged by Elsa's question - which then causes the couple to fail.

QUESTION: How much of Wagner's own life is reflected here? After all, he had numerous amorous relationships in addition to his two marriages.

UNSELD: We have to be careful here: Can we look directly into Wagner's life? Or do we only see what has been written about Wagner's life? As I said, Wagner himself strongly characterised his image as an artist through various media. This includes the image of the genius who needs his muse as a source of inspiration, but also of the revolutionary, the visionary. We should try not to fall prey to the self-staging and staging of others here.

QUESTION: That seems like a very modern game with identity and self-staging as an artist - as is taken for granted in pop culture today.

UNSELD: Wagner and pop culture are not opposites. On the contrary: Carlyle's concept was already about greatness and popularity, or popularity through greatness. For Carlyle, the hero is always the man who is visible in society and publicly celebrated. Things get exciting again when Wagner and pop culture meet. Today, for example, we can no longer listen to the "Ride of the Valkyries" without thinking of "Apocalypse Now". Incidentally, Francis Ford Coppola also stages a kind of heroism in this scene that is definitely broken. This is where Wagner research should start. It's not about showing that Siegfried is the radiant hero and Elsa the primal woman - it's about the nuances, the frictions that Wagner incorporated into the concepts of hero and woman. I am firmly convinced that these nuances and differentiations are the reason why Wagner is still attractive today. The interview appeared in the current issue of "EINBLICKE".
Read insights online: http://www.presse.uni-oldenburg.de/63102.html

On Friday, 24 January, 6 p.m., in the Chamber Music Hall (Building 11, Haarentor campus) at the University of Oldenburg, Prof. Dr Melanie Unseld will give the lecture "At the end of a Wagner year: insights or disillusionment?". The public lecture is part of the composer colloquium "Music of our time". Admission is free.