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Table of Contents

Title Page
Dedication Page
General Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations for key references
Guide to abbreviations used in text
Allen Dunning's numbered Guide to the Ring's Musical Motifs
Detailed Table of Contents

The Ring

Introduction


References
Appendix I
Appendix I I

Key Colour Coding

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I would be grateful for donations of any size, small or large, to help defray the cost (1) of maintaining this website, (2) and to finance my past and present research which produced my book posted here, Volume One of "The Wound That Will Never Heal," and my forthcoming revision of Volume One (to be submitted for publication), and completion of Volume Two on Wagner's six other canonic operas and music-dramas. I sacrificed at least seven years of paid employment and incurred debts to complete this project, and am currently unemployed, so I thank you in advance for any financial help you can provide. Your friend, Paul Heise.

Siegfried: (#33b/#77) I’ll bring back Bruennhilde for you.

 

Gunther: How do you plan to deceive her? (#33ab)

 

Siegfried: (#33ab; #42?) Through the Tarnhelm’s disguise I’ll change my shape with yours.

 

Gunther: Swear oaths, then, as a vow.

 

Siegfried: [[ #157 ]] Let an oath be sworn to blood-brotherhood.

 

(#51: Hagen fills a drinking horn with new wine and offers it to Siegfried and Gunther, who scratch their arms with their swords and hold them for a moment over the top of the horn. #151/#152; #151; #21: Both men place two fingers on the horn, which Hagen continues to hold between them)

 

Siegfried: [[ #158>> ]] The freshening blood of flowering life I let trickle into the drink. (#151/#33ab)

 

Gunther: [[ #158>> ]] Bravely blended in brotherly love, may our lifeblood bloom in the drink! (#151/#33ab)

 

Siegfried and Gunther: [[ #160 ]] Faith I drink to my friend! (#155b vari) (#111 Vari) Happy [“froh”] and free [“frei”] may blood-brotherhood [[ #157 ]] spring from our bond today! (#21/#151)

 

Gunther: [[ #159 ]] If a brother breaks the bond –

 

Siegfried: [[ #159 ]] If a friend betrays his faithful friend –

 

Both: [[ #160 ]] what we drank today in drops of sweetness shall stream in rivers, in righteous atonement of a friend.

 

Gunther: (#51/#21: drinking and then offering the horn to Siegfried) Thus do I swear the oath!

 

Siegfried: Thus – (he drinks and hands the empty drinking horn to Hagen) do I pledge my faith to you!

 

(Hagen strikes the horn in two with his sword. #51/#21; #155; #153; #156: Gunther and Siegfried join hands.)”

 

[[#158]] Siegfried’s and Gunther’s life-blood mixes in the bowl from which they drink.

Siegfried, by granting the unheroic Gunther, Siegfried’s own audience, access