Antike und Abendland. Beiträge zum Verständnis der Griechen und Römer und ihres Nachlebens, Band LXI

164 Pages·2015·5.36 MB·German

by  Werner von Koppenfels u.a. (Hg.)

Antike und Abendland
De Gruyter

Antike
und
Abendland
Beiträge zum Verständnis der Griechen und Römer
und ihres Nachlebens
herausgegeben von
Werner von Koppenfels · Helmut Krasser
Wilhelm Kühlmann · Peter von Möllendorff
Christoph Riedweg · Wolfgang Schuller
Rainer Stillers
Band LXI
2015
De Gruyter
Manuskripteinsendungen werden an die folgenden Herausgeber erbeten: Prof. Dr. Werner von Koppenfels,
Boberweg 18, 81929 München – Prof. Dr. Helmut Krasser, Institut für Altertumswissenschaften, Universi-
tätGießen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10, Haus G, 35394 Gießen– Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Kühlmann, Universität Heidelberg,
GermanistischesSeminar, Hauptstr. 207–209, 69117 Heidelberg– Prof. Dr. Peter von Möllendorff, Institut für
Altertumswissenschaften, Universität Gießen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10, Haus G, 35394 Gießen – Prof. Dr.
Christoph Riedweg,Kluseggstr.18, CH-8032 Zürich– Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schuller, Philosophische Fakultät,
Universität Konstanz, Postfach 5560, 78434 Konstanz – Prof. Dr. Rainer Stillers, Institut für Romanische
Philologie der Philipps-Universität Marburg, Wilhelm-Röpke-Str. 6D, 35032 Marburg. Korrekturen und
Korrespondenz, die dasManuskript und den Druck betrifft, sind an den Schriftleiter Prof. Dr. Helmut Krasser zu
richten.
Buchbesprechungen werden nicht aufgenommen; zugesandte Rezensionsexemplare können nicht zurückge-
schickt werden.
Abstracts sind publiziert in / indexiert in:
Arts and Humanities Citation Index · Current Contents Arts and Humanities · Dietrich’s Index philosophicus·
IBR – Internationale Bibliographie der Rezensionen geistes- und sozialwissenschaftlicher Zeitschriften-
literatur / IBZ – Internationale Bibliographie geistes- und sozialwissenschaftlicher Zeitschriftenliteratur ·
L’Année Philologique
ISSN (Print) 0003-5696
ISSN (Online) 1613-0421
Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek
Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen
Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet
über http://dnb.dnb.de abrufbar.
© 2015 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Satz: Dörlemann Satz, Lemförde
Druck: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
Ü Gedruckt auf säurefreiem Papier
Printed in Germany
www.degruyter.com
Inhaltsverzeichnis
David Sansone
Wagner, Droysen and the Greek Satyr-Play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Paola Gagliardi
Tityre, te patulae cecini sub tegmine fagi: Virgilio e Ottaviano traBucoliche e
Georgiche . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Thorsten Fögen
Ars moriendi: Literarische Portraits von Selbsttötung bei Plinius dem Jüngeren
und Tacitus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Christina Abenstein
Excitanda sunt ab inferis: […]hystoriae festenellanae.
Vom Suchen und Finden antiker Literatur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Peter Grossardt
Taubheit an Rhein und Nil– Zu Auswahl, Einführung und Funktion
der Klassikerzitate in Poggio Bracciolinis Brief über die Bäder in Baden . . . . 66
Maren Elisabeth Schwab
Julius Caesar entdeckt Amerika. Die Britannienexkursionen imBellum Gallicum
und dasEpistularium Vespuccianum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Georgios P. Tsomis
«Thus changed, I return…»: The Programmatic Prologue of the First Surviving
Opera «Euridice» (1600) by Ottavio Rinuccini and Jacopo Peri. Euripidean,
Senecan Poetics and Music as Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Peter Sprengel
Daphnis’ Scham oder die Lehre des Kentauren.
Nacktheit und Bildung im Münchner Klassizismus (Heyse, Genelli) . . . . . 137
Richard Warren
Strachan’s Calgacus: Scotland’s classical past in the art of
the Edinburgh National War Memorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
VI
Mitarbeiter des Bandes
Dr. Christina Abenstein, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Fakultät für Sprach-
und Literaturwissenschaften, Griechische und Lateinische Philologie, Schellingstraße 3,
80539 München
PD Dr. Thorsten Fögen, Durham University, Department of Classics & Ancient History,
38 North Bailey, Durham DH1 3EU, Great Britain
Paola Gagliardi, via Due Torri, 21, 85100 Potenza, Italia
apl. Prof. Dr. Peter Grossardt, Universität Leipzig, Institut für Klassische Philologie und
Komparatistik, Beethovenstraße 15, 04107 Leipzig
Prof. Dr. David Sansone, The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, The Department of the Classics– 4080 Foreign Languages Buil-
ding, 707 South Mathews Avenue, 61801 Urbana, IL
Maren Elisabeth Schwab, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Graduiertenkolleg «Ex-
pertenkulturen des 12. bis 18. Jahrhunderts» Kulturwissenschaftliches Zentrum, Heinrich-
Düker-Weg 14, 37073 Göttingen
Prof. Dr. Peter Sprengel, Freie Universität Berlin, Institut für Deutsche und Niederländi-
sche Philologie, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin
Prof. Dr. Georgios P. Tsomis, Department of Greek, Democritus University of Thrace,
University Campus, GR 69100
Dr. Richard Warren, Department of Classics, Royal Holloway, University of London,
Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX
Wagner, Droysen and the Greek Satyr-Play 1
David Sansone
Wagner, Droysen and the Greek Satyr-Play
The view is commonly expressed that Richard Wagner’s Ring des Nibelungen takes as its
model the structure of an Athenian tragic tetralogy, but modified in such a way that the
equivalent to the Greek satyr-play,Das Rheingold, comes first in the sequence.1 This view
has never been subjected to scrutiny, nor have critics made adequate use of Wagner’s source
of information regarding the ancient satyr-play. There can be no doubt that Wagner was
heavily, even decisively, influenced by Attic drama, especially by the works of Aeschylus.2
The composer’s familiarity with the work of the fifth-century dramatist depended pri-
marily upon the German translation (1832) by Johann Gustav Droysen.3 Droysen’s trans-
lation includes extensive «Didaskalien», in which he discusses the historical and intellectual
background of Aeschylean drama.4 The translation also features an attempt to reconstruct
some of the tetralogies that Aeschylus is known, or is thought, to have composed, and
these reconstructions include, in a few instances, the satyr-play that is supposed to have ac-
companied the tragedies. In his brief treatment ofAmymone, the satyr-play of the Danaid
tetralogy, Droysen quotes a saying of Ion of Chios to the effect that virtue, like a tragic per-
formance, ought to have a satyric component «als ein nothwendiges Ingredienz».5 Wagner
seems to have appreciated the significance of the satyric, since he owned a watercolor by
Buonaventura Genelli, «Dionysos, von den Musen Apollos erzogen», of which the left-
hand third is dominated by a group including a naked, grotesquely dancing satyr.6 Signifi-
cantly, in a fragmentary piece published from his Nachlaß after his death, entitled «Das
Genie der Gemeinsamkeit», Wagner says, «der Tragödie mußte aber stets zum Beschluß
das Satyrspiel folgen (notwendiges Zugeständnis!)».7
Although Wagner himself refers to theRing as a tetralogy, both in hisZukunftsmusik and
his Lebensbericht IV,8 he never, as far as I am aware, speaks of a satyr-play in connection
1 Hueffer 1890, 92; Little 1893, 23 (recording an observation of his Leipzig Professor, Oscar Paul); Zimmer-
mann 2000, 73; Williams 2004, 80; Tanner 2010, 154; Goldhill 2011, 128; Landfester 2012, 56f. (appropri-
ating without acknowledgment the wording of Bremer 1992, 310); Millington 2012, 90.
2 In addition to the works cited in the previous note, see Petsch 1907; Wilson 1919; Schadewaldt 1970; Lloyd-
Jones 1982; Ewans 1982; Roller 1992; Buller 2001; Meier 2005; Foster 2010.
3 A second edition was published in 1842 and a third in 1868. See Trzeciok 1959, 140–142; Forchert 1990.
A copy of the first edition was in Wagner’s personal library, which he had to abandon when he fled from
Dresden in 1849: von Westernhagen 1966, 84. The Wahnfried library possesses a copy of the third edition,
as well as other works by Droysen: http://www.wagnermuseum.de/files/pdf/Wahnfried-Bibliothek.pdf.
4 For the importance of Droysen’s understanding of Aeschylus to Wagner’s political views, see McGrath
2013, 81–86.
5 Droysen 1832, vol. 2, 103. The saying is quoted by Plutarch:5I(cid:2)(cid:3)(cid:4) (cid:5)(cid:6)(cid:3) —(cid:7)(cid:8)(cid:9)(cid:10) (cid:11)(cid:10)(cid:4)(cid:12)(cid:13)(cid:14)κ(cid:3) (cid:16)(cid:13)(cid:16)(cid:4)(cid:7)(cid:14)(cid:4)(cid:17)(cid:18)(cid:4)(cid:3)
$(cid:19)(cid:13)(cid:20)(cid:21)(cid:3)(cid:11)(cid:4) (cid:11)κ(cid:3) $(cid:10)(cid:9)(cid:11)κ(cid:3) (cid:22)(cid:23)(cid:9)(cid:13)(cid:3) (cid:11)(cid:13) (cid:8)(cid:24)(cid:3)(cid:11)(cid:2)« (cid:14)(cid:4)λ (cid:7)(cid:4)(cid:11)(cid:26)(cid:10)(cid:13)(cid:14)μ(cid:3) (cid:5)(cid:27)(cid:10)(cid:20)« (cid:28)(cid:29)(cid:5)(cid:9)(cid:3) (Per. 5,3 = frag. 109 Leurini).
6 Wagner was familiar with a version of this image from before 1849: Mandel 1990.
7 GS 10.216. References of the form «GS 10.216» are to the edition of Kapp 1914, by volume and page
number.
8 GS 1.201 and 256.
2 David Sansone
with the Ring. Curiously, he does use the term «satyr-play» when he recounts, in «Eine
Mitteilung an meine Freunde» (1851), the original conception of hisMeistersinger, saying:
Wie bei den Athenern ein heiteres Satyrspiel auf die Tragödie folgte, erschien mir auf jener
Vergnügungsreise plötzlich das Bild eines komischen Spieles, das in Wahrheit als bezie-
hungsvolles Satyrspiel meinem «Sängerkriege auf Wartburg» sich anschließen konnte. Es
waren dies «die Meistersinger zu Nürnberg», mit Hans Sachs an der Spitze.9
In his reference to this statement of Wagner’s, Dana Sutton writes that it «would be worth
knowing the source of his ideas about the classical satyr play».10 I think it is clear from what
was said above that Wagner’s source was the work of Droysen.
Before we examine the influence on Wagner of Droysen’s treatment of satyr-play, how-
ever, we should note here the astonishing article that the nineteen-year-old Droysen pub-
lished in theBerliner Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung. The piece, entitled «Von der Oper»,
demonstrates a vision of opera so close to what Wagner would express some twenty years
later that I find it inconceivable that the composer of the Ring was not familiar with it.11
Without using the word «Gesamtkunstwerk», Droysen describes an ideal of opera, the
«Vollendung des Drama» (18), that is based in myth and that combines the various arts,
«Poesie, Musik, Orchestik … Malerei und Plastik», all under the direction of the singular
«Genie des Dichters». This ideal was allegedly achieved by the fifth-century tragedians, but
subsequently the various arts came to be the province of specialists; nowadays (19), «man
hört Konzerte und sieht Schauspiele».12 Droysen, however, detects a ray of hope in the lyri-
cal tragedies of Schiller and in Heine’s Almansor, so that «Die Tragödie selbst beginnt das
Bedürfniss der Musik zu fühlen»; further, he praises Gluck (20) for choosing Greek myth
as the subject for his Iphigénie.13 Most striking is Droysen’s conclusion, in which he sug-
gests potential subjects for «tragedies» (26):14
So die indischen Sagen …, so die germanischen Sagen von den Nibelungen und König
Arturs, vom heiligen Kaiser Karl mit seinen 12 Genossen; so vor allen der griechische
Mythos: der feierliche Dionysos mit seinen schwärmenden Mänaden; Artemis, die näch-
tige Jägerin, wenn sie ihre Nymphen verlässt, den schlafenden Endymion zu suchen; Per-
sephone die Hades entführte, um die ihre blumensuchenden Gespielinnen klagen, und
die verwaisete Mutter.
9 GS 1.113. The trip referred to was to a spa in Marienbad; «Sängerkrieg auf Wartburg» is the subtitle of
Wagner’sTannhäuser (1845).
10 Sutton 1980, 201.
11 Droysen 1828. The article is mentioned briefly by Landfester (2012, 55f.). It is fully discussed by Forchert
(1990), who, like Landfester, considers it unlikely that Wagner was familiar with it, and by Kümmel (1967,
232–240), who does not mention Wagner in connection with the article and who ignores the importance of
myth to Droysen’s argument. At the time he wrote «Von der Oper» Droysen was close friends with Felix
and Fanny Mendelssohn; in 1829 Fanny composed a song cycle, dedicated to her brother, set to texts by
Droysen: Todd 2010, 121.
12 InDie Kunst und die Revolution (GS 10.34) Wagner speaks similarly of the dissolution of tragedy, «das voll-
endete Kunstwerk» (cf.Oper und Drama, GS 11.186), into its component parts following the demise of
Greek drama.
13 It is not clear to which of the two Iphigeneia operas he is referring, or whether he wants us to think of both.
In any event, Wagner himself would later produce a revised performing version ofIphigénie en Aulide. For
Heine as the inspiration forDer fliegende Holländer, see Wagner’sAutobiographische Skizze (GS 1.54).
14 Throughout, Droysen refers to tragedy as the only legitimate type of opera, in as much as opera ideally
aspires to revert to its original, that is Attic, form.
Wagner, Droysen and the Greek Satyr-Play 3
The relevance for Wagner of the Nibelung saga requires no comment, nor do we need to
discuss the connections that the grail legend and the story of Tristan have with the tales sur-
rounding King Arthur.15 Before Wagner settled upon the subject of what was to become the
Ring, he contemplated a number of projects, one of which was drawn from Greek myth, an
opera or drama concerned with Achilles.16 Another abandoned project was an opera on the
subject of Friedrich I «Barbarossa», which prompted Wagner to write his 1848 essay, Die
Wibelungen, in which he «elaborates the background to the aborted dramaFrederick I, re-
telling the legend of the ancient Indian peoples, of the descent through Troy and the Franks
to Barbarossa» (Millington 2005, 680). Charlemagne naturally features prominently in
Wagner’s essay, as the hero who planted firmly the kingdom of the Franks, which was to
see its finest flowering under Barbarossa (GS 6.135). India is not only the home of Fried-
rich’s ancestors (GS 6.100), it is also the location of the grail (GS 6.134), which is of obvious
relevance to both Lohengrin and Tristan and would become the focus of Wagner’s last
opera. Diana and the sleeping Endymion, along with nymphs and maenads, make an ap-
pearance in a version of the first-act ballet for the Paris production of Tannhäuser that
Wagner drafted in May 1860.17 We do not literally find Persephone and her bereaved
mother in Wagner’s works, but the theme of the abducted maiden in whose absence veg-
etation perishes is to be seen inDas Rheingold with the gods’ deprivation of Freia, who is
lamented, not by her mother but by her sister Fricka.18 In short, virtually all the subjects
identified by Droysen in 1828 as appropriate for operatic treatment can be found in some
form or another in Wagner’s works of the following decades.
We can only infer Wagner’s familiarity with Droysen’s 1828 article; we can be certain,
from his own and Cosima’s statements, that Wagner considered Droysen’s translation of
Aeschylus fundamental to his own development as a dramatist.19 As we have seen, Wagner
was aware, because of his familiarity with Droysen’s work, that a satyr-play was an obli-
gatory component of a fifth-century tragic tetralogy. Although scholars have recognized
the influence Aeschylus’Oresteia exercised on Wagner’s conception of theRing, they have
ignored Droysen’s reconstruction ofProteus, the satyr-play that accompanied the surviving
trilogy.20 Droysen begins by asserting that we can be confident, based on the nature of
Aeschylean compositional technique in general and the evidence of other tetralogies, that
the satyr-play was directly connected with the plot of the tragic trilogy. Like most critics
since his time, Droysen points to the passage inAgamemnon (617–633) in which the chorus
interrogates the herald about the fate of Menelaus, thus foreshadowing the events to be
dramatized inProteus.21 Without mentioning Homer or theOdyssey, Droysen recounts the
15 See U. Müller / A. Eder in Müller / Panagl 2002, 199–237; Watson 2002.
16 For details of these projects, see Millington 2005, with 688 on Achilles.
17 Jost and Urchueguía 2007, 476.
18 Leroy 1925, 57.
19 R. Wagner 1911, 407; C. Wagner 1980, 499; Forchert 1990; Landfester 2012, 55–57.
20 The reconstruction ofProteus appears on pages 153–158 in the first volume of the 1832 edition and remains
unchanged in the subsequent editions of Droysen’s translation. Droysen discusses other satyr-plays more
briefly in the second volume:Prometheus Feuerzünder, the satyr-play produced withPersae (51f.),Amy-
mone (103),Lycurgus (221f.) and a few others not assigned to specific tetralogies (268–272).
21 E. g. Fraenkel 1950, vol. 2, 294; R. Germar / R. Krumeich in Krumeich et al. 1999, 181; Griffith 2002, 238;
O’Sullivan / Collard 2013, 504.
4 David Sansone
events, familiar to us and to Wagner,22 from Book Four of Homer’s epic poem (351–586),
how Menelaus was detained on the island of Pharos and how Proteus’ daughter Eidothea
instructed him to overpower Proteus and force the old man of the sea to reveal the means
whereby Menelaus might find his way home to Greece. Then, anticipating suggestions
made by more recent scholars,23 Droysen proposes that the satyr-play also incorporated
the account, which Euripides in his superficial manner («in seiner oberflächlichen Weise»)
makes use of in hisHelen, of the phantom-Helen.
The satyrs also, according to Droysen’s reconstruction, have been stranded on the island
and have been forced into service by Proteus to guard the coast against the arrival of
foreigners. They are as eager as Menelaus to return to Greece, where they hope to renew
their interrupted acquaintance with wine and their pursuit of nymphs. Terrified, they hide
in the bushes during Menelaus’ encounter with Proteus, in which the latter transforms him-
self, apparently on stage, into a serpent, a lion, a tree, water and fire.24 Eventually Proteus is
forced to share the fruits of his preternatural wisdom: Agamemnon has been murdered by
Clytaemestra and has been avenged by Orestes, who is to marry Helen’s daughter Her-
mione; the Trojan War has been fought over a phantom while the real Helen has remained
in Egypt; Proteus’ own fate has now been fulfilled and he dives into the sea to spend eter-
nity alone with his daughter. The tetralogy comes to an end at dusk, as it had begun at
dawn, with only the fire on thethymele providing a source of light, until the companions of
Menelaus come onto the scene carrying torches.25 The satyrs, now freed from their ser-
vitude, rejoice, and Hermes sails through the air leading Helen by the hand to be reunited
with her husband, «der blondgelockte Held». All this is, of course, pure Romantic fantasy,
but Wagner must have assumed that it had some basis in Droysen’s extensive scholarly re-
searches.
The twin convictions, that a satyr-play was an essential feature of a dramatic tetralogy
and that the satyr-play was the concluding element of the tetralogy, must have posed a seri-
ous problem for Wagner when he eventually conceived of the Ring as a sequence of four
music dramas. His sensibilities surely rejected the idea of ending his massive creation in the
light-hearted manner suggested by Droysen’s vision of Aeschylus’ Proteus. Nor could he
violate the supposed classical mandate and simply move the equivalent of the satyr-play to
the beginning of the tragic production.26 Still, Das Rheingold, like a satyr-play, is shorter
than the more serious dramas that it accompanies and it ends in a festive, celebratory
fashion. But because the satyr-play is supposed to come last in the sequence, Wagner never
refers toDas Rheingold as such. Rather, in the letter to Franz Liszt in which he describes to
22 Wagner claims in hisAutobiographische Skizze (GS 1.41) to have translated the first twelve books of the
Odyssey as a schoolboy.
23 Valgimigli 1908; Cunningham 1994; Griffith 2002, 239–254. See also Paul Claudel’s 1914Protée,drame saty-
rique en deux actes, with incidental music by Darius Milhaud (Gumpert 2001, 296).
24 In Act 2 ofSiegfried an apprehensive Alberich similarly keeps out of sight in order to watch Siegfried com-
bat Fafner, who has transformed himself into a serpent. See below for the satyr-like character of Alberich.
25 According to Droysen (222), the conclusion ofLycurgus also is marked by «Fackelglanz», while torches
and «der Fackellauf selbst um die Thymele in der Orchestra» feature in the description ofPrometheus Feuer-
zünder (51). Droysen continues (51f.): «Als Prometheus den Menschen vom Himmel herab das Feuer
brachte, begann eine neue Ordnung der Dinge, eine neue Entwickelung des geistigen Lebens und der
menschlichen Kraft.» This is a fair description, indeed, almost a definition, of «Götterdämmerung».
26 Compare his plan to haveDie Meistersinger followTannhäuser (above, n. 9).