Info

Home Page / About Wagnerheim
Introduction by Roger Scruton
About the Author
Interactive Features
Wagner Lecture Videos
Wagner Lecture / Papers Transcript
Links
Contact Us
Discussion Forum

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

Donations Welcome

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.

Mime: (pusillanimously to himself) How can I rid myself of this intruder? (#101) My questions I must couch with care.

 

(#101: He pulls himself together, as if determined to show strictness.)

 

Mime: (aloud: #21) As pledge for my hearth, I accept your head: (#112 Fragment) Take care to redeem it with thoughtful reply! [[ #114a ]] Three are the questions I freely ask.

 

Wanderer: (#96?; #21/#41) Thrice I must hit the mark.”

 

[[#115]] Former “Power of the Gods,” and future destruction of the Gods

(#115’s motival links uncertain; Cooke describes #115 as a #21 variant based on its inversion, and transformation into a stepwise form; Millington considered it a relative of the Valhalla Motif #20; however, it sounds very like #1 – could it be a #53 variant, with perhaps #20 harmony?)

[Having already asked Wotan rhetorical questions (because Mime already knew their answer) about his knowledge of the earth’s [i.e., Erda’s] Navel-nest [“Erde Nabelnest” – Umbilical Nest], i.e., of black-Alberich’s realm Nibelheim, and of the earth’s [i.e., Erda’s) broad-back, the realm of Giants, Mime now poses his last question to Wotan the Wanderer:]

“Mime: (#41/#17; #101) … now tell me truly, which is the race that dwells on cloud-covered heights?

 

Wanderer: (#21 vari) On cloud-covered heights, there dwell the gods: (#20a >>) Valhalla is their hall. Light-elves they are; Light-Alberich, Wotan, rules their host. (#2/#53) From the World-Ash’s holiest bough he made himself a shaft: (#21) though the trunk may wither, [[ #115 ]] the spear shall never fail; (#21) with the point of that weapon [[ #115 ]] Wotan governs the world. (#21) [[ #116 ]] Hallowed treaties’ binding runes (#26a?) he whittled into its shaft: [[ #115 ]] he who wields the spear (#21) that Wotan’s fist still spans [[ #115 ]]; #45) holds within his hand control over all the world. (#5?) Before him bowed (#17) the Nibelung Host; (#45) The brood of Giants was tamed by his counsel: [[ #115 ]]; #112) forever they all obey the mighty lord of the spear!

 

(#21: In an apparently spontaneous gesture he strikes the ground with his spear; a distant role of thunder can be heard, causing Mime to jump violently.)

 

In T.P.A, a more Definitive version of #115 which heralds the fated burning up of the gods in their hall, Valhalla, is heard: