Richard Wagner
Revolutionary opera composer, Gesamtkunstwerk
Most quoted
"The error in the art-genre of Opera consists herein: that a Means of expression (Music) has been made the end, while the End of expression (the Drama) has been made a means."
— from Opera and Drama, 1851
"The destiny of us musicians is to be the first artists to disappear from this earth; for after all, what have we got to do with a world from which beauty is vanishing?"
— from Letter
"Where the world is nothing but a dream, there is no need for a world to be. But where the world is a dream, there is a need for a world to be dreamed."
— from Letters
All quotes by Richard Wagner (411)
My music is a bridge to the divine.
The artist must be a dreamer.
The greatest art is that which evokes emotion.
The human heart is a labyrinth.
My art is a journey of self-discovery.
The artist must be a rebel.
The greatest art is that which challenges us to think.
The human soul is a boundless ocean.
My music is a celebration of life.
The artist must be a visionary, a prophet, a god.
Joy is not in things; it is within us.
Music is the inarticulate speech of the heart.
The error in the art of music is that we seek to find beauty in the wrong place.
I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man in the sky. I believe that what people call God is something in all of us.
The public is never wearied by the music of a master.
Drama is the extension of music into words.
To be a musician is to be a god.
The artist belongs to his work, not the work to the artist.
In the beginning was music.
My life is a useless waste of suffering.
Contemporaries of Richard Wagner
Other Musics born within 50 years of Richard Wagner (1813–1883).