The body in the library : review of Richard Wagner Sämtliche Werke

Abstract

The first collected edition of Wagner’s musical works, the Richard Wagner Sämtliche Werke (hereafter RWSW) is a strange publication to be asked to review. Vast in sheer physical size, it comprises no fewer than seventy individual books organised in thirty-one ‘volumes’. The fact that it has appeared piecemeal since the publication of the first volume in 1970 (vol. 19, Klavierwerke, ed. Carl Dahlhaus) means that the editions hardly strike one today as ‘new’ contributions to Wagner scholarship. If the collected edition has been slowly accumulating on library shelves like a kind of bibliographic glacier, abrading the rough ground of the ‘Wagner myth’ with evermounting pressure, the widespread use of the editions of individual works in operatic productions might for some be valorisation enough. Many of the editions have been reprinted by Ernst Eulenburg and arranged as vocal scores. A review of the edition may even be premature, bearing in mind that – contrary to Schott’s recent publicity – four volumes have yet to be released. What can one say about an edition that has to all purposes already become part of the furniture?