Gesammelte Werke

would be naive, however, to assume that the indisputable destruction of German musical culture has been brought about solely by a kind of political invasion from outside, by mere force and violence. This culture underwent a severe crisis, economically no less than spiritually, before Hitler seized power. Many elements of the spirit of Fascism crystallized within the sphere of music proper, quite apart from any visible political pressure. Hitler was, in music as well as in many other respects, merely the final executor of tendencies that had developed within the womb of German society. Since we are not interested in a mere description or history of the fascist onslaught on culture, but rather want to learn from the German experience as much as we can in order to avoid a recrudescence of the evil in any other country, it may be good to have a look at some of those fascist tendencies within German music, and musical life, before Hitler. This may help us to understand better the musical climate of Fascism itself.
    A more general remark may be pertinent at this point. There can be no doubt that Fascism, as soon as it has conquered, absorbs practically all intellectual trends which are not definitely and articulately opposed to it, even the most contradictory ones. The philosophies of Fichte as well as of his modern antipode Klages, the poetry of populists, such as Gerhart Hauptmann and Hamsun, as well as of esoterics, such as George and Rudolf Alexander Schröder, political theories of hierarchical conservatism and of revolutionary activism have been equally swallowed by totalitarian ideology, undergoing on the way changes which often, as for example with the German mystic Meister Eckhardt, amounted to mutilation and complete falsification. It may thus be said that it is no good looking for fascist symptoms in pre-Hitler culture since no element of that culture was safe from being taken over by the usurper. This objection, however, is too sweeping. One can very well differentiate between artistic and philosophical phenomena which tend towards Fascism by themselves, and others which were claimed by the Nazis more or less arbitrarily, mainly on account of their prestige value. Moreover, one can clearly distinguish between names to which the Nazis did only lip service, such as Goethe and Beethoven, and others who represent ideas which are the lifeblood of the fascist movement, mostly comparatively obscure figures, such as Ernst Moritz Arndt and Paul de Lagarde.
    My observations are going to be made with an eye on these reflections. The first name that comes to everybody's mind in connection with pre-Hitler musical Fascism is that of Richard Wagner. It may be good to recollect that there is an immediate link between him and official Nazi ideology. Wagner's philosophical pupil and son-in-law, the Germanized Englishman Houston Stewart Chamberlain, was one of the first writers who combined aggressive pan-Germanism, racism, the belief in the superiority of German culture and militant anti-Semitism. The Nazi bogus philosopher Alfred Rosenberg has confessedly borrowed most of his ideas from Chamberlain's
Grundlagen des
19.
Jahrhunderts
and the latter had the blessing of Wagner himself and later of the Bayreuth circle which turned Nazi at an early date. Not only can we discover many elements of rubber-stamped Nazi doctrine in Wagner's theoretical writings but we can also spot them, which is more important, throughout Wagner's works in more or less flimsy allegorical disguise. The whole plot of Wagner's
Ring
suggests some kind of a gigantic frameup, with Siegfried as an innocent and lovable Teutonic hero who, just by chance, conquers the world and ultimately falls victim to the Jewish conspiracy of the dwarfs and those who trust their counsel. Incidentally, it is ironical enough that even the downfall of Hitler is presaged in this metaphysical master plan. Apart from such some-what crude though legitimate interpretations I should go so far as to venture that a minute musical analysis of Wagner's works yields insight into the fascist nature of his very way of composing, in a very concrete and tangible sense. It is impossible, however, to elaborate this thesis in the present paper.
    Yet I should not overrate the importance of Wagner as a formative element of Fascism. Apart from the fact that his work contains also forces entirely antagonistic to those which I mentioned his actual influence in Germany was definitely on the decline. It