The Wagner Clan: The Saga of Germany's Most Illustrious and Infamous Family

by Jonathan Carr

Overview

An Economist Best Book of 2007, Jonathan Carr’s The Wagner Clan proves, with the sweeping scope of a Wagnerian opera, that the history of Europe and that of the infamous composer’s family are inextricably intertwined. Carr presents not only Richard Wagner himself— musician, philosopher, philanderer, failed revolutionary, and virulent anti-Semite—but also a colorful cast of historical figures who feature in Wagner’s story: Franz Liszt (whose illegitimate daughter Cosima married Wagner); Friedrich Nietzsche; Arthur Schopenhauer; Richard Strauss; Gustav Mahler; Arturo Toscanini; Joseph Goebbels; Hermann Göring; and the “Wolf ” himself, Adolf Hitler, a passionate fan of the Master’s music and an adopted uncle to Wagner’s grandchildren. Wagner’s British-born daughter-in-law, Winifred, was a close friend of Hitler’s and seemed momentarily positioned to marry him after the death of her husband. All through the war the Bayreuth Festival, begun by the Master himself, was supported by Hitler, who had to fill the audience with fighting men and SS officers. After the war’s devastation, the festival was dark for a decade until Wagner’s offspring—with characteristic ambition and cunning— revived it. The Wagner Clan is a riveting chronicle of the ascent, decline, and rehabilitation of the German nation and its most infamous family.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802143990
Publisher:	Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
Publication date:	01/06/2009
Pages:	432
Sales rank:	696,314
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.30(d)

Table of Contents

List of Plates ix

Preface xi

Family Tree xv

1 A Sublime but Glaucous Sea 1

2 Revolution and Reverse 9

3 Ugly Duckling and Swan King 28

4 The Fortress on the Hill 47

5 The Plastic Demon 65

6 The Spin Doctor 90

7 Odd Man Out 111

8 Wolf at the Door 131

9 Three Funerals and a New Broom 153

10 All the Reich's a Stage 172

11 Dissonant Quartet 192

12 Mausi at Bay 206

13 War - at Home and Abroad 222

14 New Bayreuth? 244

15 The Road Not Taken 267

16 Sins of the Fathers 285

17 End of Empire? 306

18 Time Present and Time Past 321

19 Time Future? 340

Notes 353

Acknowledgements 373

Index 375