It can come as no surprise that a figure as imposing, influential, and controversial as Richard Wagner has prompted a huge volume of writings both within and beyond the domain of music. The short book here being reviewed presents some of the more recent of such writings. Although it is a volume reported to have originated from a symposium, it reads rather more like a group of invited essays. The last chapter (11) is indeed a recording of a discussion, but the participants, with one exception, are not, as might be expected, the essayists. They are a different group, one made up largely of Wagnerian performers, some of them well known; and their “shop-talk” subject, though of interest to would-be opera