Night Falls On The Gods

PROLOGUE

Die Gottrerdammerung begins with an elaborate prologue. The three
Norns sit in the night on Brynhild's mountain top spinning their
thread of destiny, and telling the story of Wotan's sacrifice of
his eye, and of his breaking off a bough from the World Ash to
make a heft for his spear, also how the tree withered after
suffering that violence. They have also some fresher news to
discuss. Wotan, on the breaking of his spear by Siegfried, has
called all his heroes to cut down the withered World Ash and
stack its faggots in a mighty pyre about Valhalla. Then, with his
broken spear in his hand, he has seated himself in state in the
great hall, with the Gods and Heroes assembled about him as if in
council, solemnly waiting for the end. All this belongs to the
old legendary materials with which Wagner began The Ring.

The tale is broken by the thread snapping in the hands of the
third Norn; for the hour has arrived when man has taken his
destiny in his own hands to shape it for himself, and no longer
bows to circumstance, environment, necessity (which he now freely
wills), and all the rest of the inevitables. So the Norns
recognize that the world has no further use for them, and sink
into the earth to return to the First Mother. Then the day dawns;
and Siegfried and Brynhild come, and have another duet. He gives
her his ring; and she gives him her horse. Away then he goes in
search of more adventures; and she watches him from her crag
until he disappears. The curtain falls; but we can still hear the
trolling of his horn, and the merry clatter of his horse's shoes
trotting gaily down the valley. The sound is lost in the grander
rhythm of the Rhine as he reaches its banks. We hear again an
echo of the lament of the Rhine maidens for the ravished gold;
and then, finally, a new strain, which does not surge like the
mighty flood of the river, but has an unmistakable tramp of hardy
men and a strong land flavor about it. And on this the opera
curtain at last goes up--for please remember that all that has
gone before is only the overture.

The First Act

We now understand the new tramping strain. We are in the
Rhineside hall of the Gibichungs, in the resence of King Gunther,
his sister Gutrune, and Gunther's grim half brother Hagen, the
villain of the piece. Gunther is a fool, and has for Hagen's
intelligence the respect a fool always has for the brains of a
scoundrel. Feebly fishing for compliments, he appeals to Hagen
to pronounce him a fine fellow and a glory to the race of Gibich.
Hagen declares that it is impossible to contemplate him without
envy, but thinks it a pity that he has not yet found a wife
glorious enough for him. Gunther doubts whether so extraordinary