Dezember: Das Liebesverbot

Written By Matthew Shadbolt

A moment from a production of Richard Wagner's second opera, Das Liebesverbot (‘The Ban on Love’)

The Score at a Glance

  • Dauer: ~3–5 hours (modular; can expand into a full evening)

  • Distanz: ~2–4 miles (plus optional transit finale)

  • Beste Zeit: Evening → late night

  • Wetter: Cold preferred; winter sharpens contrast

  • Zugänglichkeit: Flat walking; nightlife density; optional long subway ride

  • Essentieller Moment: Standing beneath Washington Square Arch as the ensemble swells — authority and joy sharing the same stage

Thematic Frame

Das Liebesverbot is Wagner at his most mischievous — young, reckless, deliberately un-Wagnerian. Inspired by Measure for Measure, it stages a carnival of desire against hypocritical law, mocking the belief that morality can be enforced through prohibition. Where earlier months dealt with gods, heroes, crowds, and collapsing systems, December turns intimate: rules applied to bodies, pleasure, and private life.

The existential problem here is not power, but control — who decides how others may live, love, gather, or enjoy themselves. Wagner exposes the absurdity quickly: the enforcer who bans pleasure secretly desires it; the city that is told to obey simply… doesn’t. Law may close doors, but it cannot erase longing.

December is the only month where the city openly cooperates with this truth. Rules loosen. Streets glow. Music leaks from doorways. People gather anyway. New York becomes Palermo-by-proxy: festive, flirtatious, willfully disobedient. The comedy matters. After a year of tragedy and collapse, Wagner ends not with redemption or fire, but with laughter and mercy.

Das Liebesverbot suggests something radical: that forgiveness may be a more durable form of order than punishment — and that joy, when shared, can be civic.

Listening Index (The Musical Spine)

Build a light, buoyant playlist. Keep motion and sparkle.

Listening note:
December should feel kinetic. Let Wagner mingle with street noise. This month welcomes interference.

Getting There (Threshold Crossing)

Starting Point:
Mulberry Street, Little Italy (Subway: 6 to Spring St; J/Z to Bowery)

  • Enter Mulberry from the south.

  • Begin the Overture as the lights appear overhead. December starts not with restraint, but with permission.

Mulberry Street

 

Music: Overture
Duration: ~20 minutes
Mode: Walking

Walk north beneath the lights.

What to notice:

  • Outdoor heaters defying winter

  • Laughter spilling into the street

  • People choosing warmth over rules

Meaning:
This is Palermo before the crackdown — pleasure as civic instinct.

Side Streets off Mulberry

 

Music: Isabella’s stern ensembles
Duration: ~15 minutes
Mode: Walking

Slip into Hester, Grand, or Broome.

What to notice:

  • Sudden quiet

  • Closed doors

  • Bodies drawing closer

Meaning:
Law can shut doors. It cannot extinguish desire.

Washington Square Park

 

Music: Large mock-serious ensembles
Duration: ~20 minutes
Mode: Walking / standing

Enter from the south. Stop beneath the arch.

What to notice:

  • Musicians bending rules

  • Lovers under monuments

  • Authority reduced to backdrop

Meaning:
Law wants a stage. So does joy. Das Liebesverbot sides with joy.

Lower East Side Nightlife Streets

 

Music: Carnival Choruses
Duration: ~30 minutes
Mode: Slow wandering

Move through Ludlow, Rivington, Orchard.

What to notice:

  • Lines forming

  • Arguments dissolving into laughter

  • Desire asserting itself through coats and scarves

Meaning:
This is Act II: the city refuses to comply.

Optional Finale: Coney Island

 

Music: Finale — Forgiveness & Rejoicing
Duration: ~30 minutes
Mode: Walking

Take the Q/F to Coney Island–Stillwell Ave.

Walk the winter boardwalk as the Finale plays.

Meaning:
The opera ends not with punishment, but pardon. Winter strips the city bare — and somehow makes room for warmth.

(If you skip this, replay the Finale on the subway ride home. It still works.)

Silence / Interruption Node (Mandatory)

  • After the Finale, turn the music off.

  • Let the city carry the last sound.

  • December ends without instruction.

Closing Movement (Mercy, Not Resolution)

  • No music.

  • Walk home lighter than you began.

  • The year does not end in certainty. It ends in release.

Companion Artifacts

Articles

  • “Law Without Joy” — prohibition, hypocrisy, and intimacy

  • “Why Mercy Works” — forgiveness as civic technology

Podcast

  • “Das Liebesverbot: Wagner Laughing”

Wanderings

  • Lights, crowds, faces, warmth against winter

Closing the Year: After Twelve Months

A year with Wagner is not about mastery. It is about attention.

You began in January wandering under a curse, listening for orientation. You passed through temptation, silence, night, craft, bargain, awakening, collapse, crowd, and fire. You end here — not with gods or systems or leaders — but with people choosing warmth, forgiveness, and proximity in the cold.

If you carry this practice forward, you don’t need another composer, another city, or another grand project. You can repeat the method:

  • Pair one work of art with one place you think you already know

  • Walk it slowly

  • Let meaning emerge through friction

  • Allow silence to do some of the work

Next year does not require escalation. It requires re-entry. Return to the city you live in. Choose one work. Begin again.

Matthew Shadbolt https://www.matthewshadbolt.com
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