Liszt and his partner, the Countess Marie d’Agoult, had two daughters and a son: Blandine (born in 1835), Cosima (1837), and Daniel (1839). After Liszt and the Countess separated permanently in 1844, the children did not live with either parent, but rather spent most of their time in the care of Liszt’s mother or at boarding schools.

In 1857 Cosima married Liszt’s former student, the celebrated pianist and conductor Hans von Bülow (1830–1894). In 1864 she began a relationship with Richard Wagner (1813–1883), whom she finally married in 1870. In 1866, when Liszt wrote the letter seen here, Cosima was still married to Bülow, but she spent most of her time with Wagner in Tribschen, Switzerland, and was pregnant with their second child. Bülow lived in Munich, where he served as music director. Despite his understandable unhappiness with the situation, Bülow did not completely dissolve his ties with Cosima, and he continued to perform Wagner’s music; in fact, he conducted the premieres of Tristan und Isolde (1865) and Die Meistersinger (1868). Much of Liszt’s letter pertains to Bülow, and is written as if he and Cosima were still a conventionally married couple. Bülow was considering a move from Munich to Basel because of a delicate political situation: Prussia had just defeated Austria in a war, and Bavaria had supported the Austrian cause, while Bülow openly favored the Prussians. This placed him in conflict with the Bavarian King, Ludwig II, who was also an important patron of music. (Liszt repeatedly refers to the King by the nickname “Sgambato.”) The letter also touches on a variety of other topics, including the 200 francs Liszt was sending to Cosima and his progress on the oratorio Christus.

Our summary is based on the full translation and commentary in Charles Suttoni, “Unpublished Liszt Letters at Yale: The Horowitz Papers,” Journal of the American Liszt Society 49 (Spring 2001), pp. 1–9. The letter itself came to Yale from Vladimir Horowitz, who received it as a gift from Cosima’s daughter, Daniela von Bülow Thode.

Cosima Wagner outlived her husband by 47 years. She was known as a forceful guardian of his reputation, and for her work in managing the Wagner festival in Bayreuth after his death. She died in 1930, just three years before Hitler’s rise to power.