Wagner: A Pictorial Biography

London & Boston: Thames and Hudson. Very Good/Very Good. 1963. First Edition. Hard Cover. Sm 4to Dust jacket complete, unclipped. Red cloth boards with bright gilt titling. No ownership inscription. 144 page. 148 photogravure illustrations. Clean and tight. Like all rebels who turned out to be geniuses, Wagner was greatly disliked in his own lifetime. He can still rouse heated reactions even today, partly on account of his music, partly on account of his personal character and partly on account of imaginary political connections. At the same time, as performances of his works show, no composer makes a more direct impact on a modern audience. Walter Panofsky, a leading Continental music-critic, has written a highly readable account of the main facts of Wagner's life, drawing on his Autobiography, letters and published sources, together with some new material recently forthcoming from Bayreuth. It is a colourful story - the years of hardship, debt and political exile, of endless travelling and constant artistic frustration, ending with the fantastically lavish patronage of Ludwig II and the triumphs of Bayreuth and Munich; at a deeper level it is a story of inner loneliness, of two marriages and numerous love-affairs, of relentless ambition in pursuit of the highest ideals. Wagner did not lack a sense of showmanship, and there are fascinating early photographs of himself, his family and colleagues at nearly every stage of his career, as well as of the exuberant operatic world that was his background. The illustrations in this volume (many hitherto unpublished) make it an essential addition to Wagner scholarship and to an understanding of the greatest master of the Romantic Age. .