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Never in my life having enjoyed the true happiness of love I shall erect a memorial to this loveliest of all dreams in which, from the first to the last, love shall, for once, find utter repletion. I have devised in my mind a Tristan und Isolde, the simplest, yet most full-blooded musical conception imaginable, & with the ‘black flag’ that waves at the end I shall cover myself over–to die.
Wagner to Liszt in 1854
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