der ring des nibelungen - Fantasy Castle Books

Keep not what is cursed!
Soon is sent darkly and downwards
he who saves the hoop.
WOTAN.
What warning woman is here?
ERDA.
How all has been, count I;
how all becomes, and is hereafter,
tell I too; the endless world's ere-Wala,
Erda, bids thee bethink.
Thrice of daughters, ere-begotten,
my womb was eased, and so my knowledge
sing to thee Norns in the night-time.
But dread of thy harm draws m
in haste hither to-day;
hearken! hearken! hearken!
Nothing that is ends not;
a day of gloom dawns for the gods;
be ruled and wince from the ring!
She sinks slowly up to the breast, while the bluish light
begins to darken.
WOTAN.
With hiding weight is holy thy word;
wait till I more have mastered!
ERDA (as she disappears).
I warned thee now thou know'st enough;
brood, and the rest forebode!
(She disappears completely.)
WOTAN.
Fear must sicken and fret me?
Not if I seize thee, and search to thy knowledge.
(He attempts to follow Erda into the cleft to hold her;
Donner, Froh, and Fricka throw themselves before him
and prevent him.)
FRICKA.
What mischief maddens thee?
FROH.
Beware, Wotan!
Hallow the Wala, hark to her word!
DONNER (to the giants).
Heed, you giants! Withhold your hurry;
the gold have, that you gape for.
FREIA.
How shall I hope it?
Was then Holda rightly her ransom's worth?
(All look with anxiety at Wotan.)
WOTAN
(has sunk in deep thought and now collects himself with
force to a decision).
To me, Freia! I make thee free;
yield us again the youth
that thy going had reft!
You giants, joy of your ring!
(He throws the ring' on the hoard.)
(The giants let Freia go; she hastens joyfully towards the
gods, who for some time caress her by turns in greatest
delight.)
(Fafner spreads out an immense sack and attacks the
hoard to pack it in it.)
FASOLT (throwing himself in his brother's way).
Softly, hungerer! Some of it hither!
Both for a wholesome half were the better.
FAFNER.
More to the maid than the gold
hadst thou not given thy heart?
With toil I brought thy taste to the bargain.
Would'st thou have wooed
but half of Freia at once ?
Halve I the hoard, rightly I hold
the roundest sack for myself.
FASOLT.
Slandering rogue! Rail at me so?
(To the gods.)
Try the matter between us;
halve for us meetly here the hoard!
LOGE.
(Wotan turns contemptuously away.)
The rest leave to Fafner;
light with thy fist on the ring!
FASOLT (falls upon Fafner, who meanwhile has been
vigorously packing his sack).
Withhold, thou meddler! Mine is the hoop;
I got it for Freia's glance.
(He grasps sharply at the ring.)
FAFNER.
Forth with thy fist! My right is first!
Wotan.
Erda.
Flee the ring's dread curse!
Hopeless and darksome disaster
lies hid it its might.
What woman warneth me thus?
All that e'er was — know I;
how all things are, how all things will be —
see I too: the endless world's allwise one,
Erda, warneth thee now.
Ere the world was, daughters three
of my womb were born; what mine eyes see,
nightly the Norns ever tell thee.
But danger most dire
calleth me hither to-day.
Hear me! Hear me! Hear me!
All that e'er was endeth!
A darksome day dawns for your godhood;
be counselled, give up the ring!
ERDA sinks slowly as far as the breast. The bluish light
begins to fade.
Wotan.
With mystic awe fills me thy word:
go not till more thou teilest!
Erda (disappearing).
I warned thee; thou know'st enough:
brood in care and fear!
(She completely disappears.)
Wotan.
If then care shall torment me,
thee must I capture, all must thou tell me!
WOTAN tries to go into the chasm to stay ERDA. FROH
and FRICKA throw themselves in his way and hold him
back.
Fricka.
Froh.
What wouldst thou, raging one?
Go not, Wotan !
Touch not the Wala, heed well her words!
Donner (turning to the giants with resolution).
Hear, ye giants! come back, and wait ye!
the gold shall be your guerdon.
Freia.
Dare I then hope it?
Deem ye Holda truly such ransom worth?
(All look attentively at Wotan.)
Wotan
(rousing himself from deep thought, grasps his spear and
brandishes it in token of a bold decision).
To me, Freia! Thou shalt be freed.
Bought with the gold,
bring us our youth once again!
Ye giants, take now your ring!
(He throws the ring on the hoard.)
The giants let FREIA go: she hastens joyfully to the gods,
who for some time caress her in turn, with the greatest
delight.
Fafner spreads out an enormous sack and sets himself to
pack the hoard into it.
Fasolt (opposing Fafner).
Stay, thou greedy one! Something give me too!
Justice in sharing fits us brothers.
Fafner.
Fasolt.
Loge.
More for the maid than the gold
hungered thy love-sick look;
I scarce could bring thee, fool, to the bargain;
as, without sharing,
Freia thou wouldst have wooed,
if now I share, trust me to seize
on the greater half for myself!
Shame on thee, thief! Tauntest thou me? —
(to the gods):
You call I as judges:
say how the hoard shall justly be halved!
(WOTAN turns contemptuously away.)
The hoard let him ravish;
hold but thou fast to the ring!
Fasolt (throws himself on FAFNER, who has, meanwhile,
been busily packing up).
Fafner.
Away! Thou rascal! mine is the ring,
mine was it for Freia's glance!
(He snatches hastily at the ring.)
Touch thou it not! the ring is mine!
words, throws the ring upon the hoard. Here the Freia Motive,
combined with the Flight Motive, now no longer agitated but
joyful, rings out gleefully. (1)
But now unaccountable darkness invades the scene; from the hollow
alcove in the rocks, letting down to the interior earth, breaks a bluish
light; while all, breathless, watch the strange phenomenon, the upper
half of a woman becomes discernible in it, wrapped in smokecoloured
veils and long black locks. It is the Spirit of the Earth, the allknowing
Erda, whose motif describes the stately progression of
natural things, and is the same as the Rhine-motif, which describes a
natural thing in stately progression. She lifts a warning hand to
Wotan. "Desist, Wotan, desist! Avoid the curse on the ring... The
possession of it will doom you to dark ruin...."
Wotan, struck, inquires in awe, "Who are you, warning woman?"
The one who knows all that was, is, and shall be, she tells him; the
ancestress of the everlasting world, older than time; the mother of the
Norns who speak with Wotan nightly. Gravest danger has brought her
to seek him in person. Let him hear and heed! The present order is
passing away. There is dawning for the gods a dark day.... At this
prophesied ruin, the music reverses the motif of ascending
progression, and paints melancholy disintegration and crumbling
downfall, a strain to be heard many times in the closing opera of the
trilogy, when the prophecy comes to pass and the gods enter their
twilight. The apparition is sinking back into the earth. Wotan
beseeches it to tarry and tell him more. But with the words, "You are
warned.... Meditate in sorrow and fear!" it vanishes. The masterful
god attempts to follow, to wrest from the weird woman further
knowledge. His wife and her brothers hold him back. He stands for a
time still hesitating, uncertain, wrapped in thought. With sudden
resolve at last he tosses the ring with the rest of the treasure, and
turns heart-wholly to greet Freia returning among them, bringing back
their lost youth. (4)
The Wala, who rises from a rocky chasm, to chaunt her mysterios
warning to Wotan, occurs in several of the Eddaic poems. As in the
Nibelung’s Ring she is introduced unher the name of Erda, so also in
the Edda she appears as the slumbering Earth, who bears hidden in
her womb the seeds of all life, and hence, as the wise Wala, she
knows the secrets of futurity. The origin of the word Wala—or Völva—
is unknown: it signifies prophetess, and, it has been suggested, is
possibly connected with the Greek sibyl. Among the old Germans and
Norsemen a belief in witchcraft, in incantations, and in the gift of
second sight, was very prevalent. Wise-women or Valas were wont to
fare the country round, from one homestead to another, working
spells and foretelling the future. Such a one was the Veleda of
Tacitus (Germania, 8), who was held as a divinity by the Germans.
The most important poem of the Elder Edda, the Völuspá—Vala’s
soothsaying—is placed by its author in the mouth of a Vala, who tells
to the sons of men tidings of the dawn and dusk of the world. But the
archetype of these soothsaying women, the Ur-Wala—primal Vala—
of Wagner, was the Earth, from whom all life springs and unto whom
all life returns, the dead woman whom Odin’s incantation calls up
from the grave to reveal the secrets of the coming time (Elder Edda,
Vegtamskvidha), the Gaia of the Greeks, to whom honours were paid
as the “first prophetic power” (Æschylus, Eumenides, 2). As
foretellers of fate the Valas held a position related to that of the Norns
or Destines, the Moiræ of Northern Mythology, and Wagner has
therefore appropriately represented the latter as the daughters of the
Wala, Erda. Thus, too, we find, among the various traditions
respecting the origin of the Moiræ, one in which they are regarded as
the offspring of Earth and Ocean; while again, Themis, the Goddess
of Law, who, in a passage of Hesiod, is described as their mother,
may fitly be compared, as an Earth-born prophetic divinity, with the
Erda of Wagner’s poem. (3)
The curse of the ring is instantly operative; for, in a quarrel
over its possession, Fafner slays his brother Fasolt. The Curse
Motive is heard and the Nibelungs baleful syncopations. (2)
While the gods are expressing tender rapture over the restoration of
Freia, and she goes from one to the other receiving their caresses,
Fafner spreads open a gigantic sack and in this is briskly stuffing the
gold. Fasolt, otherwise preoccupied, had not thought to bring a sack.
He attempts to stay Fafner's too active hand. "Hold on, you grasping
one, leave something for me! An honest division will be best for us
both!" Fafner objects, "You, amorous fool, cared more for the maid
than the gold. With difficulty I persuaded you to the exchange. You
would have wooed Freia without thought of division, wherefore in the
division of the spoil I shall still be generous if I keep the larger half for
myself." Fasolt's anger waxes great. He calls upon the gods to judge
between them and divide the treasure justly. Wotan turns from his
appeal with characteristic contempt. Loge, the mischief-lover,
whispers to Fasolt, "Let him take the treasure, do you but reserve the
ring!" Fafner has during this not been idle, but has sturdily filled his
sack; the ring is on his hand. Fasolt demands it in exchange for
Freia's glance. He snatches at it, Fafner defends it, and when in the
wrestling which ensues Fasolt has forced it from his brother, the latter
lifts his tree-trunk and strikes him dead. Having taken the ring from
his hand, he leisurely proceeds to finish his packing, while the gods
stand around appalled, and the air shudderingly resounds with the
notes of the curse. A long, solemn silence follows. Fafner is seen,
after a time, shouldering the sack, into which the whole of the
glimmering Hort has disappeared, and, bowed under its weight,
leaving for home.
"Dreadful," says Wotan, deeply shaken; "I now perceive to be the
power of the curse!" Sorrow and fear lie crushingly upon his spirit.
Erda, who warned him of the power of the curse, now proven before
his eyes, warned him likewise of worse things, of old order changing,
a dark day dawning for the gods. He must seek Erda, learn more,
have counsel what to do. He is revolving such thoughts when Fricka,
who believes all their trouble now ended, approaches him with sweet
words, and directs his eyes to the beautiful dwelling hospitably
awaiting its masters. "An evil price I paid for the building!" Wotan
replies heavily.
Soon these motives are interrupted by the Giant and Nibelung
motives, there being added to these later the Motive of the
Nibelungs’ Hate and the Ring Motive. Alberich’s curse is
already beginning its dread work. The giants dispute over the
spoils, their dispute waxes to strife, and at last Fafner slays
Fasolt and snatches the ring from the dying giant. As the gods
gaze horror-stricken upon the scene, the Curse Motive
resounds with crushing force. Loge congratulates Wotan that
he should have given up the curse-laden ring. His words are