My Interpretation of Wagner

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Name

Date

Subject

Professor 's Name

Richard Wagner - The Ring Cycle

Richard Wagner 's Ring is an opera that circles around the themes of the earthly love for power , of gaining and loosing . These themes , though present in many mythology-based stories such as J .R .R . Tolkien 's and Joseph Campbell 's , provide the Ring with a unique characteristic that do not only entertain and teaches but also make audiences relate it to real life

The main plot of the Ring dwells on how Wotan , the king

of the Gods aspire for power and how he pays for it in the end . In the story 's prequel , Wotan gains power by forging a spear made from the branch of the World Ash Tree . In that very spear , he inscribes the treaties that he makes . Those treaties , notably , are the steps of a ladder that he climbed in to gain the glory of becoming the king of the Gods . In this point , the first part of the story , the Das Rhinegold , starts

In the beginning of Das Rhinegold , three Rhinemaidens are playing in the Rhine river . Alberich , a Nibelung , meanwhile spies and steals the Rhinegold from the Rhinemaidens . Upon learning that out of the Rhinegold , one can make a ring that will

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give the bearer full power . However , making such ring requires one to renounce love . Because of anger that results from the taunting of the Rhinemaidens , Alberich has fancied the said ring and makes himself the king...