Inception of Wagner's doctrine of regeneration prior to the revolution 1848-1849
The predominant opinion in contemporary science is that Richard Wagner began formulating his doctrine of regeneration in the 1860s, with a subsequent elaboration in the so-called regeneration writings, creating a sort of theoretical platform for working on Parsifal, a festival play for the consecration of the stage. Wagner's written legacy, however, shows that he had been thinking about regeneration ever since the 1840s, as well as that he used the term in a broad range of meanings-especially considering that he used that word of the French origin as the synonym for the German word Wiedergeburt. This paper focuses on three instances where he referred to regeneration in the fifth decade of the 19th century: a letter from 1843, a text "How do republican aspirations stand in relation to the monarchy?", and a paper Art and Revolution. In 1843, Wagner had only vague ideas about regeneration in art; five years later, while the city of Dresden was eagerly awaiting the revolutionary wave from France, it was the rebirth of human society that he had in mind; after the collapse of the revolution, realizing his limitations and dispelling illusions about its success, he established a correlation-never to be dismissed-between regeneration and art; i.e. he fancied that the regeneration of the being of a nation's members could be achieved by exposing them to the effects of a special, true art.