Wagner discusses family connection to Holocaust

In a lecture hall most musicians never see, a diverse audience gathered Tuesday night in Jordan Hall Room 124 to hear from Gottfried Wagner, the great-grandson of opera composer Richard Wagner, and expectations were high.\n"I love the music, but I'm uncomfortable with his writings and actions as a person," said senior Elizabeth Pearse, a vocal performance major. "I'd like to reconcile that."\nThough Richard Wagner is considered a monumental figure in the world of opera, he was an adamant anti-Semite, writing numerous tracts on the danger of a Jewish presence in Germany. It has also been documented that Richard Wagner served as a great inspiration to Adolf Hitler during his rise to power. What was less known, however, was just how personally connected the Wagner family was to the dictator. Less known, that is, until Gottfried Wagner began researching his family's history, resulting in the publication of his autobiography "Twilight of the Wagners." \nThe book and the uncomfortable issues it raised led to a rift between Gottfried Wagner and his family, which has disowned him. He has for years committed himself to exposing the truth of his family's legacy and opening the avenues for constructive dialogue. It was this commitment that brought him to IU to deliver his lecture, "Wagner's Music and Ideology in the Political Climate of the 21st Century." \nCalling his great-grandfather a "megalomaniac," Gottfried Wagner explained that Richard Wagner was an enthusiastic communicator and desired greatly to dominate German culture and politics.\n"Were he alive today, (Richard) Wagner would have his own satellite channel and would talk 24 hours, every day of the year," Gottfried Wagner told the audience. "He wanted not to be misunderstood."\nWhat Richard Wagner wanted to communicate, however, was his utter distaste for Germany's Jewish population.\n"(The) main aspects of (Richard) Wagner were nationalism and racial superiority ... and anti-Semitism," Gottfried Wagner said.\nRichard Wagner's music often reflected his ideas on a superior race -- ideas, some have argued, that contributed to the gruesome Holocaust executed under Hitler's regime. Part of Gottfried Wagner's mission is to examine these ideas, uncomfortable though they might be, to heal the remaining wounds of that era. \n"Those who do not confront the past do not understand the present and will repeat it in the future," he told an audience member during a question and answer period following the lecture.\nGottfried Wagner said he also hopes to bring about a more honest and responsible manner of directing to the works of his great-grandfather.\n"Most directors today are cowards," he said after the lecture. \nOnly by presenting the violence that is truly a part of the music, he asserted, can critical understanding of the man, his music and his politics be achieved.\nHis comments left some members of the audience deeply moved.\n"I was enormously impressed by (Gottfried) Wagner and his efforts to call attention to the connection between his famous ancestor and the Holocaust," said Religious Studies Professor Steven Weitzman. "Gottfried Wagner shows real bravery and moral integrity by standing up against his own family and others who would choose to ignore the hateful and dangerous ideas inextricably woven into Richard Wagner's music."\n-- Contact staff writer Eric Anderson at eraander@indiana.edu.