My Life — Volume 1

Richard Wagner dictated his memoirs to his wife Cosima, and this first volume covers his life from his birth in Leipzig in 1813 to 1850. He tells of his family and his stepfather, an actor; his early passion for Beethoven and the theatre; his years as a conductor in small German theatres and his marriage to the actress Minna Planer; their flight from creditors in Riga by sea, through storms that inspired The Flying Dutchman; poverty in Paris; his success in Dresden with Rienzi and Tannhäuser, and the composition of Lohengrin; and his part in the revolution of 1849, which forced him into exile in Switzerland.

Wagner (1813–1883) began the memoirs in 1865 at the request of his patron, King Ludwig II of Bavaria; they were printed privately and published only in 1911. They are self-serving but full of vivid scenes. In Dresden in 1849 he fought beside the anarchist Bakunin, author of God and the State.