Walter Meyer reports on a Professorial lecture:

>Delius was described as an Englishman who wished he had been German.  We
>were able to hear the final scene from his *Village Romeo and Juliet*, an
>opera which, according to Lilienstein, would have been another *Gwendolyn*
>but for that last scene.

Hardly.  Delius's opera, though not very theatrical, is very much his own
throughout and absolutely crammed with original and beautiful music.  The
Wagnerian influences are totally assimilated.  Remember the "Walk to the
Paradise Garden"? Well, the "Wedding Dream" is equally lovely - clearly
inspired by the Parsifal Bells though it is - and there is much else of
this quality.

I rather think Delius wished he had been French, not German, but at least
the German opera houses had the bottle to mount his works where the English
so dismally failed him.

A less well-tilled furrow would be consideration of the influence ON
Wagner from those foreign lands, literary if not musical.  I have just
been working in Perth, Scotland, and have read Scott's novel "The Fair
Maid of Perth" after my return.

I was very forcibly struck by similarities to "Die Meistersinger".  In
theme (aristocracy against wealthy burgers), characters (Beckmesser from
Oliver Proudfoot) and milieu (Mediaeval town guilds) as well as incident
(riots and foiled abduction) and festive setting (St Valentine's Day Eve in
the Scott) Wagner clearly knew and "appreciated" Scott's 1828 novel in the
popular German translation.

After all, Scott was very much the modern literary meister at the time
Wagner was growing up, and German opera composers could hardly escape his
influence any more than the Italians.  The Bizet opera "La Jolie Fille de
Perth", paradoxically, has a lot less to do with Scott's original novel
than Wagner's work!

Christopher Webber,  Blackheath, London,  UK.
http://www.nashwan.demon.co.uk/zarzuela.htm
"ZARZUELA!"