Wilhelmine Schröder-Devrient

Wilhelmine Schröder-Devrient, daughter of Friedrich Schröder, the first German Don Giovanni, and the tragic actress Sophie Schröder, brought her mother's trade onto the opera stage. Her greatest role was Leonore, first sung in 1822; Wagner heard it at sixteen and traced his calling as a dramatic composer to the experience. For him she created Adriano in Rienzi, Senta in Der fliegende Holländer and Venus in Tannhäuser, and he wrote for the rest of his life about what her acting had taught him. She joined the Dresden uprising of 1849, was imprisoned for it, and died at Coburg in 1860.