Love, in Wagner, is so ecstatic and so terrible, because it
must compass all its anguish and delight into an immortal moment, before
which there is only a great darkness, and only a great darkness
afterwards. Sorrow is so lofty and so consoling because it is no less
conscious of its passing hour.
And meanwhile action is not everything, as it is for other makers of
drama; is but one among many modes of the expression of life. Those long
narratives, which some find so tedious, so undramatic, are part of
Wagner's protest against the frequently false emphasis of action. In
Wagner anticipation and memory are seen to be often equally intense with
the instant of realisation. Siegfried is living with at least as
powerful and significant a life when he lies under the trees listening
to the song of the birds as when he is killing the dragon. And it is for
this that the "motives," which are after all only the materialising of
memory, were created by Wagner. These motives, by which the true action
of the drama expresses itself, are a symbol of the inner life, of its
preponderance over outward event, and, in their guidance of the music,
their indication of the real current of interest, have a spiritualising
effect upon both music and action, instead of, as was once thought,
materialising both.
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