In the midst of war in 1915, composer and music critic Gustave Samazeuilh wrote a letter to the short-lived journal La Musique pendant la guerre, applauding its editors’ initiative and regretting that his wartime responsibilities did not allow him to contribute. He then turned to recent calls to ban German (and specifically Wagner’s) music, a move which he opposed:

Samazeuilh's wartime characterization of Wagner's music dramas as masterpieces “capable of surviving the most violent conflicts” foreshadows the Wagner criticism he published over the next three decades, justifying Wagner's music as a force that transcended conflict and politics by virtue of its universality. The persistence in his writings of this theme of universality over a period spanning two world wars points to the central argument in this book: that the Occupation-era discourse that positioned Wagner as a vehicle for Franco-German collaboration did not constitute a rupture with earlier Wagner reception in Paris. Rather, it was rooted in Wagner discourses developed previously, depicting Wagner as emblematic of universality and Franco-German rapprochement, as well as an object of both fear and attraction. By a great irony of history, the concept of a universal Wagner that had been used to resist the Nazis in the 1930s was transformed into the infamous collaborationist rhetoric promoted by the Vichy government and exploited by the Nazis between 1940 and 1944.

Samazeuilh displayed a particular talent for seamlessly shifting and adapting his Wagner commentary to suit changing political exigencies.