February 13 1883
Around three in the afternoon, one hundred and thirty-eight years ago today, Dr. Friedrich Keppler established that the great master did not survive a heart attack.
Friedrich Nietzsche completed the first part of his Thus Spoke Zarathustra in the “sacred hour of Wagner’s death”. After reading the news in the papers the next morning, he spent several days ill in bed.
Giuseppe Verdi was in shock.
Gustav Mahler ran the streets, crying.
Music pieces were composed, and poems were written in celebration of his life.
According to Alex Ross, in “Wagnerism — Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music”
(Such details are mentioned in “Wagnerism —- Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music”, by Alex Ross)
The gifted visionary, aesthete, master of the music drama, librettist, composer, father of the modern opera, influencer of intellect, creativity, and social mindset, Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born in Leipzig on May 22 1813, and died in Venice on February 13 1883.
