JOURNALfor the STUDYof ANTISEMITISM

2011] ANTISEMITISM IN WAGNERIAN OPERA 253
son and Delilah, Sullivan’s Ivanhoe, and Verdi’s Nabucco.
In effect, it is generally assumed—in fact, it is asserted as possible
evidence of Wagner’s non-hostile view of Jews—that, unlike the few cases
mentioned above, nowhere are Jews present or even remarked upon in
Wagner’s operas. The evidence presented above, however, contradicts this
assertion.
SOME OF HIS BEST FRIENDS . . .
Wagner’s antisemitism is sometimes said to be exaggerated. Manfred
Eger, then director of the Richard Wagner museum in Bayreuth and organizer
of a 1985 exhibition on Wagner and the Jews, admits that some of
Wagner’s utterances “could have been attributed to the National Socialist’s
violently antisemitic publication, Der Stuermer, 17 but adds that “several of
[Wagner’s] colleagues and friends were Jews.”
The exhibition brochure stressed Wagner’s supposed appreciation of
Jewish composers such as Mendelssohn and Halevy. The reference to Mendelssohn
as a Jewish composer is the worst possible example for Eger to
have employed in this context since doing so, even with the best of intentions
and without malevolence, is an example of racial antisemitism. Mendelssohn,
as it is frequently forgotten, became a Lutheran Protestant at the
age of four, when his father, Abraham, had the entire family, including the
children, converted to Christianity. And in Wagner’s eyes—as well as the
eyes of many antisemites, including Hitler’s—there was no such thing as a
former Jew. For Eger to refer to Mendelssohn as a Jew is little different
from the National Socialist argument that Jewishness was such a sufficient
evil that even divesting oneself of it by conversion to Christianity was inadequate
for entry into German society; i.e., Jewishness was perceived as a
ugly stereotype that needs to be eliminated from English usage. A more suitable
translation would be The Jewish Woman. While many languages enforce a gender
distinction, English does not. In medieval literature, the term “Jewess” was used
synonymously with “witch,” or “sorceress.” Further, such a use marginalizes Jewish
women, since no one uses gender-based terms to describe female members of
other religions. It would be ludicrous to hear the term “Protestantess,” or
“Catholicess,” though the term “Mormoness” does appear from time to time. In the
case of animals, the terms “lioness,” “tigress,” and “pantheress” suggest an aura of
feline savagery for a Jewess. In Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, the term, when referring
to Rebecca, is generally pejorative.
17. Der Stuermer was a weekly Nazi newspaper and a central element of the
Nazi propaganda machine. The founder and publisher was Julius Streicher. At the
Nuremberg trials after the war, Streicher was convicted of crimes against humanity
and executed.