Die Feen
August Kubizek, a boyhood friend of Adolf Hitler, claimed that Hitler was so influenced by seeing "Rienzi" as a young man in 1906 or 1907 that it triggered his political career, and that when Kubizek reminded Hitler, in 1939 at Bayreuth, of his exultant response to the opera Hitler had replied, "At that hour it all began!" Although Kubizek's veracity has been seriously questioned, it is known that Hitler possessed the original manuscript of the opera, which he had requested and been given as a fiftieth birthday present in 1939. The manuscript was with Hitler in his bunker; it was either stolen, lost or destroyed by fire in the destruction of the bunker's contents after Hitler's death (the manuscript of Wagner's earlier work "Die Feen" is believed to have met with the same fate). Thomas Grey comments: