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Updated: June 26, 2025
With grim comfort he recalls at this moment that the end cannot be far, not if there be truth in the prophecy of Erda: "When the dark enemy of love shall in wrath beget a son, the end of the Immortals will not be long delayed." For the loveless Alberich, as Wotan knows, has by means of gold won the favour of a woman, and the "fruit of hatred" is on its way toward the light.
Erda rises to most mysterious music, counsels Wotan to surrender the Ring, and sinks down again to her sleep; and one forgets the irrelevancy in the thrill of this vision of the Mother Earth, the spirit that sleeps amongst the everlasting hills. Finally the composer gets his great chance, and shows that, like Handel and his own Donner, he "could strike like a thunderbolt."
Perhaps the scene is unduly protracted, but the music goes on merrily enough. The renewed altercation with the Giants calls for little remark. When, however, the Giants demand the Ring and Wotan calls up Erda, the wisdom of the earth, a passage occurs which, though more or less of an irrelevant interpolation, gives Wagner a chance of putting forth his strength.
Brema's Fricka is noble and full of charm; Schumann-Heink sings the music of Erda with some sense of its mystery and of Waltraute in "Siegfried" with considerable passion; and Gulbranson has vastly improved her impersonation of Brünnhilde since last year.
When Erda, the First Mother of life, rises from her sleeping-place in the heart of the earth, and warns him to yield the ring, he obeys her; the ring is added to the heap of gold; and all sense of Freia is cut off from the giants.
Wotan refuses to give up the ring until warned by the goddess Erda, the mother of the Fates, who rises from her subterranean cavern, that to keep it means ruin. The ring passes to the giants, and the curse at once begins to work. Fafner slays Fasolt in a quarrel for the gold, and carries off the treasure alone. Throughout this scene the clouds have been gathering round the mountain-top.
Whatever works be theirs, to that Eternally Young One, the god in gladness yields his place. Down, then, Erda! Ancient Fear! Original Care! To your eternal sleep! Down! Down!..." Erda sinks into the earth, the glimmering light fades from the cave. A bird-note is heard, light and sharp, approaching. A bird flutters into sight and Siegfried, following it, appears upon the scene.
Yes: Erda, the First Mother, must travail again, and breed him a race of heroes to deliver the world and himself from his limited powers and disgraceful bargains. This is the vision that flashes on him as he turns to the rainbow bridge and calls his wife to come and dwell with him in Valhalla, the home of the gods. They are all overcome with Valhalla's glory except Loki.
Many of the characters are the elements typified the water-nymphs, the giants, Donner, Loge, Erda. Wotan himself rides on the tempest, surrounded with fearful lightnings; the Valkyrie maidens ride through the air on supernatural horses amidst thunder and wind and rain.
Both Wotan and Erda know what the end will be; and I can only take it that Wagner, fully aware that each of the constituent operas of the Ring would certainly be performed separately, wanted to make his intention and the whole plot clear to those who had not seen the earlier parts of the work. Musically it shows signs of that over-ripeness I have just spoken of.
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