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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

Donations Welcome

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.

(#95 is a compound motif comprised of #88 and #92; it is part of the family of heroic motives stemming from the last three notes of #53, which also includes #71, #77, #88, and perhaps #152)

[[#96ab]] Bruennhilde’s appeal to Wotan to refrain from debasing her for doing what he, in his innermost self, desired

Bruennhilde appeals to Wotan to refrain from debasing the ageless part of himself, Bruennhilde, by leaving her (and thus his unspoken secret, which she keeps) vulnerable to be won and wed by a common, unheroic man (i.e., by a man who is not, like Siegfried, an unconsciously inspired artist-hero)

(#96ab is in the family of motifs deriving either from #21’s Embryo, or the Definitive Motif #21, which includes #28, #32b, #60, #62, #81AB, part of #83, #137, and #164; through inversion of #21, it is indirectly related to #47 and #82)

[[#97]] Wotan puts Bruennhilde to sleep on a mountaintop after taking her godhead away, ostensibly to punish her by leaving her to be won by any man who wakes and finds here, but actually so that the artist-hero Siegfried will win her love

Commonly called “Bruennhilde’s Magic Sleep.” Wotan prepares to leave the repository of his unspoken secret (the secret hoard of knowledge he obtained from Bruennhilde’s mother Erda – Mother Nature), his unconscious mind Bruennhilde, asleep, so that his heir, the artist-hero Siegfried, can wake and win her. In this way Siegfried can safely draw subliminal inspiration from Wotan’s abhorrent self-knowledge, through loving union with his muse Bruennhilde, to produce an art which will redeem the world from Alberich’s curse of consciousness

(#97 based on #32b “Godhead Lost,” with perhaps some influence of #33b. Cooke notes #97 also contains some #19 harmony.)

[[#98]] Bruennhilde’s plea to Wotan to protect her vulnerable sleep with hideous terrors, so only a fearless hero (the Waelsung Siegfried) can win her love

Only an authentically unconsciously inspired artist-hero, such as Siegfried, ought to have access to Wotan’s