22 May: Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner, German composer famous for the Ring Cycle and Tristan and Isolde was born on this date in 1813. 10 things you might not know about him.

1. Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born in the Jewish quarter of Leipzig. Officially, he was the son of Carl Friedrich Wagner, a police clerk, and his wife, Johanna. Carl died not long after Wagner's birth and Johanna moved in with actor and playwright Ludwig Geyer. Until he was fourteen, Wagner was known as Wilhelm Richard Geyer. It's even possible that he was actually Geyer's son, not Carl Wagner's.
2. Unlike many composers, Wagner was not a child prodigy in Music. He wasn't all that good at it, and struggled to play scales on the Piano. He was much more interested in writing plays and showed little interest in music until he realised the most successful dramas included music. Only then did he set out to learn music.
3. He wrote his first Opera when he was 20. It was called Die Feen ('The Fairies') but it was never performed in his lifetime.
4. His next opera was called Das Liebesverbot (The Ban on Love), based on Shakespeare's Measure for Measure. By now, Wagner had a post as musical director at the opera house in Magdeburg and Das Liebesverbot was performed there, but only once. It closed after the first performance and the theatre went bankrupt leaving Wagner in debt.
5. He'd fallen in love with one of his leading actresses, Christine Wilhelmine "Minna" Planer. He followed her to Königsberg, where she helped him to get an engagement at a theatre there. The couple married but the marriage wasn't a happy one. They both had affairs and separated more than once. When she died, Wagner didn't attend her funeral. When Minna died, he was already involved with a woman called Cosima von Bülow, wife of Hans von Bülow, and the daughter of one of Franz Liszt's lovers. She had a daughter fathered by Wagner while she was still married to von Bülow. She asked him for a divorce but it wasn't until she'd had two more of Wagner's children that he granted her one. After her divorce she married Wagner and they remained married for the rest of Wagner's life.
6. Wagner spent 12 years in exile from Germany after taking part in the unsuccessful May Uprising in Dresden in 1849. He had to get his friend Franz Liszt to stage his opera Lohengrin in his absence.
7. His political views remain controversial to this day. He wrote antisemitic articles, despite having been born and brought up in a Jewish area, having Jewish friends and possibly even being Jewish himself. He may well have started writing the essay Jewishness in Music because he was jealous of the success of Jewish composers at a time when he wasn't successful himself. The fact that Hitler was a fan hasn't helped his reputation. Hitler allegedly said: "Whoever wants to understand National Socialist Germany must know Wagner," and there is evidence Wagner's music was played to prisoners at Dachau concentration camp to "re-educate" them.
8. On a more positive note, Wagner was an animal lover and was very fond of his Dogs. He had a spaniel called Pep, to whom he'd play his compositions. He became a vegetarian after reading an anti-vivisection tract book called The Torture Chambers of Science. Other things we know about his likes and dislikes: he loved satin, velvet and silk, and would run silk through his fingers to get him in the mood for composing. He seemed somewhat obsessive about the curative properties of Water. His daily routine included getting up at 5.30am and applying a wet pack, a cold bath at 7am, followed by a walk, two enemas, a cold compress on his abdomen, a wet rubdown followed by another walk - all before lunch. He didn't like England much, describing his trip there to to conduct eight concerts for the Philharmonic Society, as being like “a damned soul in hell”.
9. One thing Wagner is famous for is leitmotifs - melodies associated with particular characters or situations in a drama. Modern films make use of them all the time. An example of a leitmotif is the Imperial March in Star Wars, which represents Darth Vader. Wagner didn't invent them but was the first composer to make extensive use of them.
10. He died of a heart attack in Venice in 1883. Rumour has it that the heart attack was brought on by an argument with his wife about his interest in another woman called Carrie Pringle, but there's no concrete evidence for that.

Closing the Circle

A stable wormhole has been established between Earth and Infinitus. Power Blaster and his friends can finally go home.

Desi Troyes is still at large on Earth - Power Blaster has vowed to bring him to justice. His wedding to Shanna is under threat as the Desperadoes launch an attempt to rescue their leader. 

Someone from Power Blaster's past plays an unexpected and significant role in capturing Troyes.

The return home brings its own challenges. Not everyone can return to the life they left behind, and for some, there is unfinished business to be dealt with before they can start anew.

Ben Cole in particular cannot resume his old life as a surgeon because technology no longer works around him. He plans a new life in Classica, away from technology. Shanna hears there could be a way to reverse his condition and sets out to find it, putting herself in great danger. She doesn't know she is about to uncover the secret of Power Blaster's mysterious past.

Available from:

Amazon (Paperback)

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Completes The Raiders Trilogy. 

Other books in the series:

Book One

Book Two