Kirsten Paige, On the Politics of Wagnerian Care

On 7 October 1876, the London circular The Musical World published a short column entitled ‘Returned from Bayreuth’. In it, a fictional character, Sir Evelyn Blood, recalls his journey to Richard Wagner’s Festspielhaus in rural Bavaria to witness one of the first performances of the Ring cycle. ‘Returned from Bayreuth’ was accompanied by a cartoon of Leech as sinewy, leering physician, towering over a bloated Blood.