What's the Connection Between wagner's Operas and Naziism?

It appears Hitler had quite a few guilty pleasures:

Hitler’s lost music collection reveals ‘forbidden’ Jewish and Russian composers

Far from it. Lang’s mother was a Jew, as was his first wife. When the Nazis rose to power, he left Germany (in 1934) for Paris and then the U.S. (abandoning what would have been a lucrative career after his numerous successes). He divorced his second wife, leaving her in Germany, after she became a Nazi party member, and proceeded to make a number of anti-Nazi thrillers in the States: Man Hunt, Hangmen Also Die, Ministry of Fear, Cloak and Dagger. His “Mabuse” films made in Germany were also thinly veiled criticisms of National Socialism.

I find Hitler’s love of Beethoven’s music amusing because Beethoven would’ve detested him and would’ve passed snarky notes about him at the cafe.

Heard a joke a while back: Austria’s greatest triumph was convincing the world that Beethoven was an Austrian and Hitler wasn’t.

As Mark Twain said, Wagner has wonderful moments and terrible quarter hours.

Rossini, not Twain.

Originally: M. Wagner a de beaux moments, mais de mauvais quart-d’heures.

I stand corrected–but it sure sounds like something Twain would have said! :smiley:

Opera. Bleeach. Had to listen to far too much of it while I was in school and NEVER again.

Twain seems to have said a lot of things he never said. :slight_smile:

Perhaps you are thinking of his essay The Damned German Language.
:slight_smile:

Twain’s famous quote is:

“Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.” (intentional irony I guess?)

Good thing she never got to watch Don Mendo’s Revenge then. In Spanish we have the expression “even the prompter dies, in that story” - in Don Mendo, it’s actually true.