|
Cosima Wagner (December 25, 1837 -April 1, 1930) was an illegitimate daughter of the composer, Franz Liszt, but became famous as the second wife of another composer, Richard Wagner.
She was born at Bellagio, Italy, to Countess Marie d'Agoult, an author under the pen name Daniel Stern, a long-standing mistress of Liszt. In 1857, she married Hans von Bülow, an orchestral conductor, who mistreated her. It was he who introduced her to Wagner, who was many years her senior and himself already married. They became intimate in 1862, and in 1866, they set up home together at Lucerne, Switzerland. Cosima already had two children from her first marriage, and her first child by Wagner, Isolde, was born before she re-married. From 1869 to Wagner's death in 1883, she kept a diary of their life together, which was later published.
|
