“Pointing out the Path to Salvation”: Wagner’s Continuum of Love in Tristan und Isolde
The influence of Arthur Schopenhauer’s Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung (1818–19) on Richard Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde (1857–59) is well established—particularly in the idea of redemption through the over-coming of the Will by intellect (or body by soul). However, Schopenhauer’s metaphysics of love do not account for the sum of Wagner’s own metaphysics in Tristan. Where Schopenhauer’s denial of the Will is pessimistic, Wagner’s view of desire does not compromise the soul, instead leading it higher and “pointing out the path to salvation” through a “pacification of the will through [sexual] love.”
This paper proposes that Plato’s Symposium provides a way to understand Wagner’s metaphysical continuum of love in Tristan in place of the body/soul dualism of Schopenhauer. Wagner claimed to have written Art and Revolution under the impression of the dialogue and Cosima’s diaries indicate that he considered the Symposium and Tristan together, noting, “what in the one is philosophy is music in the other.”
In the Symposium, Plato’s Diotima describes love as a continuum rather than the dualism of body or soul often associated with his theory of Forms: “[Love’s] father is wealthy and wise, and his mother poor and foolish. Such… is the nature of the spirit Love.” Through this understanding of love, Wagner crafted characters capable of love and transcendence, without the pessimism of Schopenhauer’s full denial of Will.
For Wagner, transcendence did not nullify any love experienced in the physical realm. Tristan and Isolde’s Liebestod does not render their physical love inconsequential; instead, physical love becomes a necessary step towards the love presented by Diotima. In Tristan, neither passion nor the transcendence of a Schopenhaurian death constitute the true happiness of love. Instead, love, fully sated, encompasses the whole continuum: from initial glance, through eros, and higher.
The influence of Arthur Schopenhauer’s Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung (1818–19) on Richard Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde (1857–59) is well established—particularly in the idea of redemption through the over-coming of the Will by intellect (or body by soul). However, Schopenhauer’s metaphysics of love do not account for the sum of Wagner’s own metaphysics in Tristan. Where Schopenhauer’s denial of the Will is pessimistic, Wagner’s view of desire does not compromise the soul, instead leading it higher and “pointing out the path to salvation” through a “pacification of the will through [sexual] love.”
This paper proposes that Plato’s Symposium provides a way to understand Wagner’s metaphysical continuum of love in Tristan in place of the body/soul dualism of Schopenhauer. Wagner claimed to have written Art and Revolution under the impression of the dialogue and Cosima’s diaries indicate that he considered the Symposium and Tristan together, noting, “what in the one is philosophy is music in the other.”
In the Symposium, Plato’s Diotima describes love as a continuum rather than the dualism of body or soul often associated with his theory of Forms: “[Love’s] father is wealthy and wise, and his mother poor and foolish. Such… is the nature of the spirit Love.” Through this understanding of love, Wagner crafted characters capable of love and transcendence, without the pessimism of Schopenhauer’s full denial of Will.
For Wagner, transcendence did not nullify any love experienced in the physical realm. Tristan and Isolde’s Liebestod does not render their physical love inconsequential; instead, physical love becomes a necessary step towards the love presented by Diotima. In Tristan, neither passion nor the transcendence of a Schopenhaurian death constitute the true happiness of love. Instead, love, fully sated, encompasses the whole continuum: from initial glance, through eros, and higher.