s what was happening on the
stage or in the minds of the characters. There was to be no aria
or fixed form of ballad, but continuous melody, in which the
voices of the characters are regarded as extra instruments of the
orchestra, with just that element of personality included....

To have succeeded entirely in this bold design he would have had
to be a Shakespeare in poetry and knowledge of human nature, as
well as a musician of equal ability. How could any one man fulfil
both of these roles? In the matter of the music Wagner is a very
Shakespeare. But if we take his own writings as evidences of what
he meant to do, then his librettos must necessarily be
unsatisfactory. They keep the dramatic idea in sight so much as
almost entirely to lose sight of poetic beauty. Wagner was
pre-eminently a musician; he was not a poet, as he wished also to
be. Whatever his poetical achievements, the main fact is
unaltered. The dramatic idea and the musical expression are kept
so indissolubly close by Wagner as to be one for all intents and
purposes.

Of Wagner's treatment of the vocalist he says:

The melody sung is modelled upon the way in which the speaking
voice rises and falls in accordance with the feelings of the
moment. With marvellous skill the master of Bayreuth has made the
music sung reflect as clearly as any oration what are the
thoughts and feelings of the character. The orchestra makes, as
it were, a tide or ocean, over which the voice, in this manner,
floats, now rising high on the crest of the wave, now sinking
into the trough of the seas. Sometimes for added poignancy,
Wagner makes the voice sing the _leitmotif_ of some idea
connected with the idea of the moment. This is constantly
occurring in _Die Meistersinger_.

After scornful allusions to French and Italian opera, he shows how
Wagner re-fashioned opera on new and nobler lines. Replying to those
who say "You must have lightness sometimes," he wrote:

Yes, but never triviality. If we want lightness of touch and
wittiness, have we not _Die Meistersinger_, the greatest comedy
in the world, or a merry piece like Mozart's _Nozze di Figaro_?
Here is all the wit that one wants, yet the level is kept high
throughout. It is the same in literature. We have absurd, banal
pieces, said to be humorous, suc