Richard Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagnerwas a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is primarily known for his operas. Unlike most opera composers, Wagner wrote both the libretto and the music for each of his stage works. Initially establishing his reputation as a composer of works in the romantic vein of Weber and Meyerbeer, Wagner revolutionised opera through his concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk, by which he sought to synthesise the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, with music subsidiary to drama...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionComposer
Date of Birth22 May 1813
CityLeipzig, Germany
CountryGermany
I am writing Parsifal only for my wife - if I had to depend on the German spirit, I should have nothing more to say.
Attack and defence, want and war, victory and defeat, lordship and thraldom, all sealed with the seal of blood: this from henceforth is the History of Man.
If experiments on animals were abandoned on grounds of compassion, mankind would have made a fundamental advance.
Achievements, seldom credited to their source, are the result of unspeakable drudgery and worries.
The long-term vision is to replace, repair and regenerate failing tissues and organs with the materials of tissues and organs. It's still 'out there,' but it's possible to put together a grant proposal now that doesn't sound completely crazy.
In contrast to reincarnation and karma, all other views seem petty and narrow
Human dignity begins to assert itself only at the point where man is distinguishable from the beast by pity for it.
Plant life instead of animal food is the keystone of regeneration. Jesus used bread instead of flesh and wine in place of blood at the Lord's Supper.
The immoral profession of musical criticism must be abolished.
We must learn to die, and to die in the fullest sense of the word. The fear of the end is the source of all lovelessness
Wherever the fish are, that's where we go.
What a wonderful work Wagner has done for humanity in translating the toil of life into the readable script of music! For those who seek the tale of other worlds his magic is silent; but earth-travail under his wand becomes instinct with rhythmic song to an accompaniment of the elements, and the blare and crash of the bottomless pit itself.
What Music expresses is eternal, infinite, and ideal; she expresses not the passion, love, desire, of this or that individual in this or that condition, but Passion, Love, Desire itself, and in such infinitely varied phases as lie in her unique possession and are foreign and unknown to any other tongue...So...Here's to Victory, gained by our higher sense over the worthlessness of the vulgar! To Love, which crowns our courage...To the day, to the night!...And three cheers for Music...
Whatever my passions demand of me, I become for the time being - musician, poet, director, author, lecturer or anything else.