Tannhäuser (full title Tannhäuser und der Sängerkrieg auf der Wartburg / Tannhäuser and the Singers' Contest at Wartburg) is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two Germanic legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg. The story centres on the struggle between sacred and profane love, and redemption through love (a theme running through almost all Wagner's mature work).
Heinrich Heine had provided Wagner with the inspiration for Der fliegende Holländer and Wagner drew on the same source for the plot of Tannhäuser. Heine's sardonic poem Elementargeister, telling of the lure of the grotto of Venus was published in 1837 in Der Salon. Wagner also drew material from E. T. A. Hoffman's story The Singer's Contest and Ludwig Tieck's 1799 story Faithful Eckhart and Tannhäuser. Wagner wrote the prose draft of Tannhäuser between June and July 1842 and the libretto in April 1843.
The libretto of Tannhäuser combines the mythological element of...
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