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Updated: May 4, 2025
One giant, Fafner, kills his brother to get all, and transforms himself into a dragon to guard his wealth. The gods enter Valhalla over the rainbow bridge. This ends the first part of the drama, called the Rhine-Gold. The second part, the Valkyrie, relates how Wotan still covets the ring. He cannot take it himself, for he has given his word to the giants. He stands or falls by his word.
Such souls aforetime have inspired and guided worlds, and if we be not wholly bewitched by our Rhine-gold, they shall again.
One giant, Fafner, kills his brother to get all, and transforms himself into a dragon to guard his wealth. The gods enter Valhalla over the rainbow bridge. This ends the first part of the drama, called the Rhine-Gold. The second part, the Valkyrie, relates how Wotan still covets the ring. He cannot take it himself, for he has given his word to the giants. He stands or falls by his word.
Wakened so bright!" Still Alberich stood and stared at the gold. "What is it?" he gasped. "What is it?" The Rhine-daughters shouted back to him: "Heigh-ho! and heigh-ho! Dear little imp of woe, Laugh with us, laugh with us! Heigh-ho and heigh-ho!" But Alberich did not laugh with them. He would not take his eyes off the gold. "That," said the maidens, "is our Rhine-gold."
How careless we have been!" "Nonsense," answered one. "Who would fear this little black fellow? He will do us no harm. Let him gaze upon the gold. Come, let us sing!" The maidens joined hands and circled about the gold, singing: "Hail to thee! Hail to thee! Treasure most bright! Rhine-gold! Rhine-gold! Beautiful sight! "Hail to thee! Hail to thee! Out of the night! Rhine-gold! Rhine-gold!
There, upon the summit of a rock, lies the mysterious treasure of the Rhine, the Rhine-gold, guarded night and day by the three Rhine-maidens Wellgunde, Woglinde, and Flosshilde, who circle round the rock in an undulating dance, joyous and light-hearted 'like troutlets in a pool. Alberich, the prince of the Nibelungs, the strange dwarf-people who dwell in the bowels of the earth, now appears.
And Wellgunde follows this part-revelation with the whole secret: The whole world would be his inheritance who should fashion out of the Rhine-gold a magic ring. Vainly Flosshilde tries to silence her sisters. Wellgunde and Woglinde laugh at her prudence, reminding her of the gold's assured safety in view of the condition attached to the creation of the ring.
Out of the Rhine-gold it was forged; he who shaped it and miserably lost it, placed a curse upon it long ago, that it should bring death upon him who wore it. As you slew the dragon, even so shall you be slain, and this very day, of this we warn you, unless you give us the Ring to bury in the deep Rhine; its water alone can allay the curse!"
Clumsily he courts the maidens, trying unsuccessfully to catch first one, then another. Suddenly the rays of the rising sun touch the treasure on the rock and light it into brilliant splendour. The maidens, in delight at its beauty, incautiously reveal the secret of the Rhine-gold to the inquisitive dwarf. The possessor of it, should he forge it into a ring, will become the ruler of the world.
There is likewise less need in the case of this opera than, I think, any other of Wagner's, to be familiar beforehand with the argument. Any one seeing the Rhine-gold unprepared would probably not understand anything whatever, as far as the story is concerned. The same is in some degree true of Walkuere and Goetterdaemmerung; even of Parsifal one need to know the inwardness of the plot.
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