"The Dark Ages of Juvenile Literature do not afford a chronicle of greater atrocity!
"Than that furnished by a very glum, grim, gruesome, gory, but connubially-minded gentleman, whose ugly blue beard was a perfect monstrosity!
"He also had an unfortunate predilection for leading unattached ladies to the altar, constantly marrying wives, six wives, successively one after another, on a regular railroad of matrimonial velocity!
"But, finding them _in_toto_, all very so-so, determined to turn each one of them into a good woman by cutting off her head!
"As a punishment for the most unmitigatedly determined and persevering female curiosity!"(With naivete') "But to our tale!"
The "tale" introduces the lovely, luckless Fatima, sitting at her cottage window, dreaming the dreams of girl-hood. She has received Bluebeard's message of love, and is awaiting his coming as the hero of her heart's romance. This "_Traum_" theme is almost precisely like the "Guileless Fool Motive" of "Parsifal," and the application to Fatima is unmistakable.
ARIA
"Within sight of his castle, a short hour's ride, "An impecunious old lady lived, two marriageable and impecunious daughters beside, "Whom Bluebeard had seen and at love's highest pitch "Sent to say he would marry, he didn't care which!
"Sent to say he would marry, he didn't care which!"We now have Bluebeard's triumphal journey toward Fatima's cottage, from whence he is to bring her as his bride. If this brutal bigamist had any preference it was for Anne, Fatima's younger sister, but he knew that it was only a matter of a few weeks anyway, so there is not the slightest hint in the music of anything but the tempered joy with which the accustomed bridegroom approaches the familiar altar.
We have the "Blaubart Motiv" again here, and we must not be disturbed to find it heralded thus:
(noisily and fussily: Repeated deep notes)
We find the same thing later on. This is merely an introductory phrase, the "_Losgehenlassen_Motiv_" (See Me Getting Ready to Go Motive). Here we note Wagner's sublime regard for truth and realism. Does Bluebeard go--does anybody go--without getting ready to go? Certainly not; yet they have gone for years when-ever they liked, in the shiftless operas of the Italian school, without the least preparation. They would even come back before they went, if it were any more pleasing, pictorial, or melodious. It took a heroic genius like that of Wagner to return to the simple, eternal truth of things. We have a striking example here of Wagner's power of modifying and inverting a motive, carrying it from key to key, giving it forwards and backwards, upside down and other-end-to, according to the feeling he wishes it to express, whether it be love, rage, desire, impatience, ardor, or what not. The "_Losgehenlassen_Motiv_" is simplicity itself when it first appears in C major (see motive). But Bluebeard's exits are many --partly because his entrances are so numerous--and for every exit this motive conveys a new meaning. Blue-beard is always getting ready to go, but with what different purposes in mind! He goes for pastime and for passion; he goes for wooing and for wantoning; for marriage and for murder. He goes in D sharp with pomp, pride, and power, and we can distinguish the tread of his servants' feet, the clatter of arms, and the hurrying together of his escort and retinue. He goes again in B flat minor, stealthily and unattended, the orchestra giving the motive with muted violins and subdued brass. We seem to hear naught but the soft pad-pad of his felt bedroom slippers on the marble steps, and we murmur to one another: "What does he propose to do now?
We have next the "Dragon," "Elephant," and "Tiger" _motive_: the "Dragon Motive" being intentionally reminiscent of the one in "Siegfried."There is not in the entire range of modern music anything more impressive than this splendid journey of a barbaric prince toward his chosen victim.
No stage picture could be more dazzling than the one brought before the mind's eye in the majestic, munificent measures that herald the pageant:
ARIA
"And true to his message the lover did come With cymbals and horns and a big Indian drum!
The measures that follow these describe the tiger swinging on behind the triumphal cab. This is a delicious whimsicality, and the music is as gay and sportive as anything in "Die Meistersinger."ARIA
"And an elephant, huge, to his cab... was confined."....
How the character of Bluebeard stands out in these passages--Bluebeard, morbid, erotic, megalophonous megalomaniac, with his grandiose air and outlandish accoutrements!
It seems odd that rumors of his matrimonial past had not reached Fatima, for the libretto tells us (authorized opera-house edition, not the one sold on the sidewalk) that his castle was only an hour's ride distant. In any event, one would think the sight of the lover's approach, with lions and elephants in attendance and a tiger hanging on behind the chariot, might have shown Fatima that, although Bluebeard might be admirable as an advance agent for a menagerie, he would hardly be a pleasant fireside companion.
