The Texts of Wagner's "Der junge Siegfried" and "Siegfried" Author(s): Daniel Coren Source: 19th-Century Music, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Summer, 1982), pp. 17-30 Published by: University of California Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/746228 Accessed: 08-11-2017 01:27 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms University of California Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to 19th-Century Music This content downloaded from 70.103.220.4 on Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:27:21 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms The Texts of Wagner's Derjunge Siegfried and Siegfried DANIEL COREN On 10 May 1851 Wagner wrote in a letter On tothe his impetus of this insight, Wagner com- friend Theodor Uhlig: posed a new dramatic poem, Der junge Sieg- fried, intending it as an introduction to Sieg- I have been plagued by an idea all winter, and have been so strongly inspired by it that I am now frieds going Tod, to the original version of Gotterddim- realize it [as a drama]. The idea concerns the merung, lad who which he had written in 1848 and sets out to learn fear, but who is so dumb 1849.that heWith is his fresh vision of Siegfried before not able to succeed. Imagine my astonishment him, when he was able to work with remarkable I suddenly realized that lad is none other speed. than-the He wrote some fragmentary prose young Siegfried, who won the hoard and awakenedsketches for the new drama early in May, an Briinnhilde!'1 extended version by the end of the month, and had completed the entire poem by June 24th.2 Der junge Siegfried can in some respects be viewed as an expansion of Der Nibelungen- 1"Da hat mich nun ... den ganzen Winter eine Idee gep- Mythus als Entwurf zu einem Drama, the orig- lagt, die mich kiirzlich ... als Eingebung so vollstiindig un- terjocht hat, dass ich sie jetzt realisiren werde .... Es war dies der Bursche, der auszieht, 'um das Fiirchten zu lemen,' und so dumm ist, es nie lernen zu wollen. Denke Dir meinen Schreck, als ich plitzlich erkenne, dass dieser Bursche niemand Anders ist, als-der junge Siegfried, der 2Ibid., pp. 63-69. den Hort gewinnt und Briinnhilde erweckt!" Otto Strobel, Richard Wagner: Skizzen und Entwurfe zur Ring- 0148-2076/82/020017+ 14$00.50 C 1982 by The Regents Dichtung (Munich, 1930), p. 65. of the University of California. 17 This content downloaded from 70.103.220.4 on Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:27:21 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 19TH CENTURY inal prose scenario which had preceded Sieg- mythological material that would have been MUSIC frieds Tod in 1848. Siegfried's life in the forest presented only through narrative or oblique with Mime, his forging of Nothung, his slaying references. But in writing Walki're and Rhein- of Fafner, his understanding of the Forest-Bird, gold, Wagner did considerably more than ex- and his winning of Briinnhilde-in short, all of pand what had been plot exposition into actual Siegfried's mythological accomplishments- dramatic action. As he worked backwards are contained in that brief scenario. On the through the cycle, he inevitably found that he simplest level, Der junge Siegfried makes had to create a more and more detailed explicit the impressive but unspecified dossier mythological world. These details, in turn, of heroic acts that Siegfried brings with him on furnished ideas that had not even occurred to his journey down the Rhine in Siegfrieds Tod, him in writing Der junge Siegfried,: but that be- and the two poems together conform to came some of the most important features of Wagner's original idea of a grand opera center- the finished Ring. ing around Siegfried. After the Walkaire and Rheingold poems In Der junge Siegfried, however, a new layer had been written, Der junge Siegfried was has been added to the mythological attributes necessarily subjected to extensive revision. that Wagner had ascribed to Siegfried in Sieg- Briinnhilde, Mime, Alberich, and Fafner had frieds Tod. In the new drama, Siegfried's con- now acquired detailed past histories, and their cern with fear furnishes his heroism with a roles had to be adjusted accordingly. But most psychological depth it had not possessed be- important of all, by this time the central focus fore, and, as Wagner's letter to Uhlig indicates, of the Ring had shifted from Siegfried to Wo- Siegfried's deeds in themselves are now not tan:as from 1852 on, Wagner saw the world he important as his motivation in performing was creating more and more in terms of the them. Der junge Siegfried-like, eventually, god. When Der junge Siegfried was revised, Siegfried itself-is concerned with the de- Siegfried himself hardly changed, but the Wan- velopment of the hero's psyche through his derer became a far more complex character, pursuit of the unknown. Ultimately this pur- and his scenes were changed much more radi- suit allowed Wagner to reveal his own percep- cally than other portions of the drama. In Der tion of the intimate connection that exists be- junge Siegfried, the Wanderer is merely re- tween fear and sexual experience. signed, in a vague sort of way; this resignation But Der junge Siegfried is not about Sieg- is largely responsible for the unsubstantial im- fried alone. Wotan, in his guise as the Wan- pression he makes. But in Siegfried, after we derer, also appears in this poem-although have seen him in the two previous dramas, his there had been no mention of his presence in quiet exterior covers tensions that must at last the portion of the Nibelungen-Entwurf con- come to the surface. In the third act of Sieg- cerning Siegfried. Compared with the noble fried, Wotan becomes a paradoxical and power- and austere figure with whom we are familiar ful figure. His former passivity becomes an ec- in Siegfried, the Wanderer in Der junge Sieg- static willingness to abandon his powers, yet, fried is only tentatively sketched. However, his despite this willingness, he allows himself to mere juxtaposition with Siegfried shows that be drawn into combat with Siegfried. in 1851 Wagner was already on his way to re- Siegfried's words and actions are transposed casting some of his basic thought about the directly from Der junge Siegfried with virtually Nibelung material. In fact, immediately upon no significant changes. One might at first be the completion of Der junge Siegfried, he felt led to believe that there was simply no need for the necessity of writing the poems for Die Wagner to alter the character who had crystal- Walkzire and Das Rheingold, and had com- lized in his mind so suddenly in May 1851. pleted them by the middle of 1852. Wagner himself surely wanted to create this Walkeire and Rheingold involved further impression when, in 1854, while he was com- penetration into the first few pages of the posing the music for Rheingold, he described Nibelungen-Entwurf, or, from the point of Siegfried as "my ideal of the perfect human be- view of a hypothetical audience for Der junge ing, whose highest consciousness ... can find Siegfried, the unravelling of an obscure mass of expression only in the most actual living..,. of 18 This content downloaded from 70.103.220.4 on Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:27:21 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms the present."3 But the subsequent history of II DANIEL COREN Wagner's Der Wagner's work on the Ring indicates that Sieg- In examining the revisions of Der junge junge Siegfried fried may have remained as he had been in Der Siegfried, it will be useful to designate two junge Siegfried not because he was entirely broad categories of material. First, there are the satisfactory, but because Wagner had begun to revisions that Wagner might well have made lose touch with him. It should be stressed that even if he had not decided to expand the cycle after 1851, Wagner devoted relatively little from two to four poems; second, there are mental energy to the contents of the dramas inthose made necessary by Rheingold and Wal- the Ring that concern Siegfried. By the time hekdire. had finished the music for Walkire in 1856, his The first category involves, for the most work for the past four years had been almost part, manipulation of detail. While these ma- exclusively devoted to the first half of the cy- nipulations at times become quite involved, cle. The composition of the music for Rhein- they do not reflect the more profound gold and Walkare had, after a start was made, philosophical changes that characterize the re- been quite easy for him, and his musical lan- vision resulting from the growth of the Ring guage had operated with remarkable consis- cycle beyond Der junge Siegfried. It should also tency over more than seven hours of music- be made clear at the outset that substantial drama. But the composition of the music for portions of Der junge Siegfried remain un- Siegfried proved to be a far more difficult task changed in Siegfried-in general, scenes in- and when at length he reached the Waldweben volving Siegfried himself.