Madame Schroder-Devrient, whom Wagner had in his mind in writing the part of Venus, sang that role, but, in spite of all her talent, the first performance was not a success. She wrote to Wagner concerning it, and said, 'You are a man of genius, but you write such eccentric stuff it is hardly possible to sing it.' The public in general, accustomed to light operas with happy endings, was dismayed at the sad and tragical termination, and, while some of the best musical authorities of the day applauded, others criticised the work unsparingly. Schumann alone seems to have realised the force of the author's new style, for he wrote, 'On the whole, Wagner may become of great importance and significance to the stage,'--a doubtful prediction which was only triumphantly verified many years afterward. Like many of the mediaeval legends, the story of Tannhauser is connected with the ancient Teutonic religion, which declared that Holda, the Northern Venus, had set up her enchanted abode in the hollow mountain known as the Horselberg, where she entertained her devotees with all the pleasures of love. When the missionaries came preaching Christianity, they diligently taught the people that all these heathen divinities were demons, and although Holda and her court were not forgotten, she became a type of sensual love. Tannhauser, a minstrel of note, who has won many prizes for his songs, hearing of the wondrous underground palace and of its manifold charm, voluntarily enters the mountain, and abandons himself to the fair G.o.ddess's wiles. Here he spends a whole year in her company, surrounded by her train of loves and nymphs, yielding to all her enchantments, which at first intoxicate his poetic and beauty loving soul.

But at last the sensual pleasures in which he has been steeped begin to pall upon his jaded senses. He longs to tear himself away from the enchantress, and to return to the mingled pleasure and pain of earth.

The first scene of the opera represents the charmed grotto where Venus gently seeks to beguile the discontented knight, while nymphs, loves, bacchantes, and lovers whirl about in the graceful mazes of the dance, or pose in charming att.i.tudes. Seeing Tannhauser's abstraction and evident sadness, Venus artfully questions him, and when he confesses his homesickness, and his intense longing to revisit the earth, she again tries to dazzle him, and cast a glamour over all his senses, so as to make him utterly oblivious of all but her.

Temporarily intoxicated by her charms, Tannhauser, when called upon to tune his lyre, bursts forth into a song extolling her beauty and fascination; but even before the lay is ended the longing to depart again seizes him, and he pa.s.sionately entreats her to release him from her thrall:--

''Tis freedom I must win or die,-- For freedom I can all defy; To strife or glory forth I go, Come life or death, come joy or woe, No more in bondage will I sigh!

O queen, beloved G.o.ddess, let me fly!'

Thus adjured, and seeing her power is temporarily ended, Venus haughtily dismisses her slave, warning him that he returns to earth in vain, as he has forfeited all chance of salvation by lingering with her, and bidding him return without fear when the intolerance of man has made him weary of life upon earth.

A sudden change of scene occurs. At a sign from Venus, the grotto and its voluptuous figures disappear; the roseate light makes way for the glaring sunshine, and Tannhauser, who has not moved, suddenly finds himself upon the hillside, near the highroad and the shrine of the Virgin, and within sight of the Wartburg castle, where he formerly dwelt and won many a prize for his beautiful songs. The summer silence is at first broken only by the soft notes of a shepherd singing a popular ballad about Holda, the Northern Venus, who issues yearly from the mountain to herald the spring, but as he ceases a band of pilgrims slowly comes into view. These holy wanderers are all clad in penitential robes, and, as they slowly wend their way down the hill and past the shrine, they chant a psalm praying for the forgiveness of their sins. The shepherd calls to them asking them to pray for him in Rome, and, as they pa.s.s out of sight, still singing, Tannhauser, overcome with remorse for his misspent years, sinks down on his knees before the Virgin's shrine, humbly imploring forgiveness for his sins:--

'Oh, see my heart by grief oppressed!

I faint, I sink beneath the burden!

Nor will I cease, nor will I rest, Till heavenly mercy grants me pardon.'

While he is still kneeling there, absorbed in prayer, the Landgrave and his minstrel knights appear in hunting costume. Their attention is attracted by the bowed figure of the knight, and when he raises his head they recognise him as their former companion. Some of the minstrels, jealous of his past triumphs, would fain regard him as their foe, but, influenced by one of their number, Wolfram von Eschenbach, they welcome him kindly and ask him where he has been. Tannhauser, only partly roused from his half lethargic state, dreamily answers that he has long been tarrying in a land where he found neither peace nor rest, and in answer to their invitation to join them in the Wartburg declares he cannot stay, but must wander on forever.

Wolfram, seeing him about to depart once more, then reminds him of Elizabeth, the fair chatelaine of the Wartburg, and when he sees that, although Tannhauser trembles at the mere sound of the name of the maiden he once loved, he will nevertheless depart, he asks and obtains the Landgrave's permission to reveal a long kept secret.

Wolfram himself has long loved the fair Elizabeth, but such is his unselfish devotion that he would fain see her happy even with a rival. To win the light back to her eyes and the smile to her lips, he now tells Tannhauser how she has drooped ever since he went away, and generously confesses that she took pleasure in his music only, and has persistently avoided the minstrel hall since his departure. His eloquent pleading touches Tannhauser's reawakening heart, and he finally consents to accompany the Landgrave and his minstrels back to the Wartburg. Hither they now make their way on foot and on horseback, singing a triumphal chorus:--

'He doth return, no more to wander; Our loved and lost is ours again.

All praise and thanks to those we render Who could persuade, and not in vain.

Now let your harps indite a measure Of all that hero's hand may dare, Of all that poet's heart can pleasure, Before the fairest of the fair.'

The second act is played in the great hall of the Wartburg castle, which is festively decorated, for the minstrels are again to contend for the prize of song, a laurel wreath which will again be bestowed as of yore by the fair hands of the beloved Princess Elizabeth. As the curtain rises she is alone in the hall, no longer pale and wan, but radiant with happiness, for she knows that Tannhauser, her lover, has returned, and she momentarily expects him to appear. While she is greeting the well known hall, the scene of her lover's former triumphs, with a rapturous little outburst of song, the door suddenly opens and Wolfram appears, leading the penitent Tannhauser, who rushes forward and falls at Elizabeth's feet, while his friend discreetly withdraws. Elizabeth would fain raise the knight, telling him it is unbecoming for him to a.s.sume so humble an att.i.tude beneath the roof where he has triumphed over all rivals, and she tenderly asks where he has lingered so long. Tannhauser, ashamed of the past, and absorbed in the present, declares that he has been far away, in the land of oblivion, where he has forgotten all save her alone:--

'Far away in strange and distant regions, And between yesterday and to-day oblivion's veil hath fallen.

Every remembrance hath forever vanished, Save one thing only, rising from the darkness,-- That I then dared not hope I should behold thee, Nor ever raise mine eyes to thy perfection.'

Elizabeth is so happy to see him once more, so ready to forgive him at the very first word of repentance, that Tannhauser cannot but see how dearly she loves him, and they soon unite in a duet of complete bliss, rejoicing openly over their reunion, and vowing to love each other forever, and never to part again.

The Landgrave appears just as their song is ended, to congratulate Elizabeth upon having at last left her seclusion and honoured the minstrels with her presence. In conclusion, he declares that, as all the contestants know she will be there to bestow the prize, the rivalry will be greater than ever. He is interrupted in this speech, however, by the entrance of knights and n.o.bles, who file in singing a chorus in praise of the n.o.ble hall, and of Hermann, Landgrave of Thuringia, the patron of song, whom they repeatedly cheer. When they have all taken their appointed places, the Landgrave, rising in his seat, addresses them, bidding them welcome, reminding them of the high aims of their art, and telling them that, while the theme he is about to propose for their lays is love, the princess herself will bestow as prize whatever the winner may ask:--

'Therefore hear now the theme you all shall sing.

Say, what is love? by what signs shall we know it?

This be your theme. Whoso most n.o.bly this can tell, Him shall the princess give the prize.

He may demand the fairest guerdon: I vouch that whatsoe'er he ask is granted.

Up, then, arouse ye! sing, O gallant minstrels!

Attune your harps to love. Great is the prize,'

At the summons of the heralds, Wolfram von Eschenbach first takes up the strain, and as for him love is an ardent desire to see the loved one happy, a longing to sacrifice himself if need be, and an att.i.tude of worshipful devotion, he naturally sings an exalted strain. It finds favour with all his hearers,--with all except Tannhauser, who, having tasted of the pa.s.sionate joys of unholy love, cannot understand the purity of Wolfram's lay, which he stigmatises as cold and unsatisfactory.

In his turn, he now attunes his harp to love, and sings a voluptuous strain, which not only contrasts oddly with Wolfram's performance, but shows love merely as a pa.s.sion, a gratification of the senses. The minstrels, jealous for their art, indignantly interrupt him, and one even challenges Tannhauser to mortal combat:--

'To mortal combat I defy thee!

Shameless blasphemer, draw thy sword!

As brother henceforth we deny thee: Thy words profane too long we've heard!

If I of love divine have spoken, Its glorious spell shall be unbroken Strength'ning in valour, sword and heart, Altho' from life this hour I part.

For womanhood and n.o.ble honour Through death and danger I would go; But for the cheap delights that won thee I scorn them as worth not one blow!'

This minstrel's sentiments are loudly echoed by all the knights present, who, having been trained in the school of chivalry, have an exalted conception of love, hold all women in high honour, and deeply resent the attempt just made to degrade them. Tannhauser, whose once pure and n.o.ble nature has been perverted and degraded by the year spent with Venus, cannot longer understand the exalted pleasures of true love, even though he has just won the heart of a peerless and spotless maiden, and when Wolfram, hoping to allay the strife, again resumes his former strain, he impatiently interrupts him.

Recklessly now, and entirely wrapped up in the recollection of the unholy pleasures of the past, Tannhauser exalts the G.o.ddess of Love, with whom he has revelled in bliss, and boldly reveals the fact that he has been tarrying with her in her subterranean grove.

This confession fills the hearts of all present with nameless terror, for the priests have taught them that the heathen deities are demons disguised. The minstrels one and all fall upon Tannhauser, who is saved from immediate death at their hands only by the prompt intervention of Elizabeth.

Broken-hearted, for now she knows the utter unworthiness of the man to whom she has given her heart, yet loving him still and hoping he may in time win forgiveness for his sin, she pleads so eloquently for him that all fall back. The Landgrave, addressing him, then solemnly bids him repent, and join the pilgrims on their way to Rome, where perchance the Pope may grant him absolution for his sin:--

'One path alone can save thee from perdition, From everlasting woe,--by earth abandon'd, One way is left: that way thou now shalt know.

A band of pilgrims now a.s.sembled From every part of my domain; This morn the elders went before them, The rest yet in the vale remain.

'Tis not for crimes like thine they tremble, And leave their country, friends and home,-- Desire for heav'nly grace is o'er them: They seek the sacred shrine at Rome.'

Urged to depart by the Landgrave, knights, n.o.bles, and even by the pale and sorrowful Elizabeth, Tannhauser eagerly acquiesces, for now that the sudden spell of sensuous love has departed, he ardently longs to free his soul from the burden of sin. The pilgrims' chant again falls upon his ear, and, sobered and repentant, Tannhauser joins them to journey on foot to Rome, kneeling at every shrine by the way, and devoutly praying for the forgiveness and ultimate absolution of his sins.

When the curtain rises upon the third and last act of this opera, one whole year has slowly pa.s.sed, during which no tidings of the pilgrims have been received. It is now time for their return, and they are daily expected by their friends, who have ardently been praying that they may come home, shrived and happy, to spend the remainder of their lives at home in peace. No one has prayed as fervently as the fair Elizabeth, who, forgetting her wonted splendour, has daily wended her way down the hillside, to kneel on the rude stones in front of the Virgin's wayside shrine. There she has daily prayed for Tannhauser's happy return, and there she kneels absorbed in prayer when Wolfram comes down the path as usual. He has not forgotten his love for her, which is as deep and self-sacrificing as ever, so he too prays that her lover may soon return from Rome, entirely absolved, and wipe away her constant tears. Elizabeth is suddenly roused from her devotions by the distant chant of the returning pilgrims.

They sing of sins forgiven, and of the peace won by their long, painful journey to Rome. Singing thus they slowly file past Wolfram and Elizabeth, who eagerly scan every face in search of one whom they cannot discover.

When all have pa.s.sed by, Elizabeth, realising that she will see her beloved no more, sinks slowly down on her knees, and, raising her despairing eyes to the image of the Virgin. Then she solemnly dedicates the remainder of her life to her exclusive service, in the hope that Tannhauser may yet be forgiven, and prays that death may soon come to ease her pain and bring her heart eternal peace:--

'O blessed Virgin, hear my prayer!

Thou star of glory, look on me!

Here in the dust I bend before thee, Now from this earth oh set me free!

Let me, a maiden, pure and white, Enter into thy kingdom bright!

If vain desires and earthly longing Have turn'd my heart from thee away, The sinful hopes within me thronging Before thy blessed feet I lay.

I'll wrestle with the love I cherish'd, Until in death its flame hath perish'd.

If of my sin thou wilt not shrive me, Yet in this hour, oh grant thy aid!

Till thy eternal peace thou give me, I vow to live and die thy maid.

And on thy bounty I will call, That heav'nly grace on him may fall.'

This prayer ended, the broken-hearted Elizabeth slowly totters away, while Wolfram von Eschenbach, who has seen by her pallid face and wasted frame that the death she prays for will not tarry long, sorrowfully realises at last that all his love can save her no pang.

When the evening shadows have fallen, and the stars illumine the sky, he is still lingering by the holy shrine where Elizabeth has breathed her last prayer. The silence of the night is suddenly broken by the sound of his harp, as he gives vent to his sorrow by an invocation to the stars, among which his lady-love is going to dwell ere-long, and as he sings the last notes a pilgrim slowly draws near. Wolfram does not at first recognise his old friend and rival Tannhauser in this dejected, foot-sore traveller; but when he sees the worn face he anxiously inquires whether he has been absolved, and warns him against venturing within the precincts of the Wartburg unless he has received Papal pardon for his sins.

Tannhauser, instead of answering this query, merely asks him to point out the path, which he once found so easily, the path leading to the Venus hill, and only when Wolfram renews his questions does he vouchsafe him a brief account of his journey to Rome. He tells how he trod the roughest roads barefooted, how he journeyed through heat and cold, eschewing all comforts and alleviation of his hard lot, how he knelt penitently before every shrine, and how fervently he prayed for the forgiveness of the sin which had darkened not only his life but that of his beloved. Then, in faltering tones, he relates how the Pope shrank from him upon hearing that he had sojourned for a year in the Venus hill, and how sternly he declared there could be no more hope of pardon for such a sin than to see his withered staff blossom and bear leaves:--

'If thou hast shar'd the joys of h.e.l.l, If thou unholy flames hast nurs'd That in the hill of Venus dwell, Thou art for evermore accurs'd!

And as this barren staff I hold Ne'er will put forth a flower or leaf, Thus shalt thou never more behold Salvation or thy sin's relief.'

Tannhauser now pa.s.sionately describes his utter despair, after hearing this awful verdict, his weary homeward journey, and his firm determination, since he is utterly debarred from ever seeing Elizabeth again, either in this world or in the next, to hasten back to the hill of Venus, where he can at least deaden his remorse with pleasure, and steep his sinful soul in sensual love. In vain Wolfram pleads with him not to give up all hope of ultimate salvation, and still to repent of his former sin; he insists upon returning to the enchantress who warned him of the intolerance of man, and whom he now calls upon to guide his steps to the entrance of her abode.

This invocation does not remain unheard by the fair G.o.ddess of beauty. She appears in the distance with her shadowy train, singing her old alluring song, and welcoming him back to her realm. Tannhauser is about to obey her beckoning hand, and to hasten after her in the direction of the Horselberg, when the sound of a funeral chant falls upon his ear. A long procession is slowly winding down the hill. The mourners are carrying the body of the fair Elizabeth, who has died of grief, to its last resting place.

While Tannhauser, forgetting all else, is gazing spellbound at the waxen features of his beloved, thus slowly borne down the hill, Wolfram tells him how the pure maiden interceded for him in her last prayer on earth, and declares that he knows her innocent soul is now pleading for his forgiveness at the foot of the heavenly throne. This hope of salvation brings such relief to Tannhauser's tormented heart, that he turns his back upon Venus, who, realising her prey has escaped, suddenly vanishes in the Horselberg with all her demon train.

Kneeling by Elizabeth's bier, Tannhauser fervently prays for forgiveness, until the bystanders, touched by his remorse, a.s.sure him that he will be forgiven,--an a.s.surance which is confirmed as he breathes his last, by the arrival of the Pope's messenger. He appears, bearing the withered staff, which has miraculously budded and has burst forth into blossoms and leaves:--