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Table of Contents

Title Page
Dedication Page
General Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations for key references
Guide to abbreviations used in text
Allen Dunning's numbered Guide to the Ring's Musical Motifs
Detailed Table of Contents

The Ring

Introduction


References
Appendix I
Appendix I I

Key Colour Coding

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I would be grateful for donations of any size, small or large, to help defray the cost (1) of maintaining this website, (2) and to finance my past and present research which produced my book posted here, Volume One of "The Wound That Will Never Heal," and my forthcoming revision of Volume One (to be submitted for publication), and completion of Volume Two on Wagner's six other canonic operas and music-dramas. I sacrificed at least seven years of paid employment and incurred debts to complete this project, and am currently unemployed, so I thank you in advance for any financial help you can provide. Your friend, Paul Heise.

Hagen: (as before: #37?) Your entreaty would quickly force him if (#150?) Gutrune bound him first.

 

Gutrune: [[ #153>> ]] You mock me, wicked Hagen! (#164 Hint?) How should I ever bind Siegfried? If he’s the world’s most glorious hero, (#152 vari) the loveliest women on earth (#24 Vari Violin) would have wooed him long ago.

 

Hagen: [[ #153 ]] leaning closer towards Gutrune, confidentially) [[ #153 >> ]] Recall the potion in the chest; (more secretively) trust in me who obtained it; (#37/#24 Vari; #? [possibly music which expressed Siegfried’s loneliness in S.2.3, just before the Woodbird told him of Bruennhilde?]) it will bind to you in love the hero for whom you long.

 

(#57 merges with #42?: Gunther has returned to the table and, leaning on it, listens attentively.)

 

Hagen: If Siegfried were to enter now (#57; #? [as if #57 merges with #42?]; [[ #153 Vari ]]) and taste the herbal drink, (#42) he’d be [[ #154 ]] forced to forget that he’d (#24; #139?; #42) seen a woman before you, (#24; [[ #154 ]] that a woman had ever come near him. (#151) Now tell me: - [[ #161 End Fragment ]] what think you of Hagen’s advice?

 

Gunther: (Starting up, animatedly: #151) (#152 Vari) Praise be to Grimhild’, who gave us our brother!”

 

[[#154]] “Hagen’s Potion” – The Wagnerian “Wonder” (Wagner’s musical motif) betrays the secret of the poet-dramatist’s (Wotan’s) unconscious aim to Siegfried’s audience, making them fellow-knowers of Wotan’s unspoken secret

(#154 in the family of motifs based on #35, including #42, #43, #48, and #100)

[See #153 for #154’s dramatic context]

 

[[#155]] The Gibichungs’ Mime-like proffer of “false friendship” to Siegfried: they will drug him and exploit him to win honors for themselves which they can’t win on their own merits

(#155 is in the family of Gibichung motifs based on a specific interval drop, which includes #151, #156, #171, and perhaps #165)