I found plenty of reputable critics, as recently as 1980, discussing the "19th-century misinterpretation" that something caused the librettist to change his mind in the middle of writing the story, thus explaining the abrupt change of identity for all the characters. Now I don't feel like such a dupe for having bought that idea myself.
Andrew mentioned that there is "not the slightest evidence for" this idea, and no doubt he's right. As far as I can tell, aside from the libretto iself, there is damn scarce real evidence for anything at all about how it was written. It is in the absence of any real evidence that so much speculative theories flourish.
From one of the story's detractors, Wolfgang Hildesheimer [tr Faber], I find this curious paragraph:
<< Goethe's remark to Eckermann on April 13, 283, that Die Zauberfl�te is full of "improbabilities and jokes, which not everyone is capable of understanding and appreciating," does, it is true, have something of the nature of a defense against expected attacks.� But it was none other than Goethe who laid the cornerstone for the positive evaluation of the text, with an assertion that Schikaneder admirers wear like badge; it legitimizes them and vindicates them.� Goethe declared, "It takes more education to appreciate the worth of this libretto than to deny it,"� There we have it.� So defenders of the libretto usually begin, "No less a man than Goethe..." etc.� Since Goethe, there has been a pious tradition of explaining away the opera's meaningless action by invoking its "hither meaning"�(Goethe).� Those with a "loftier consciousness" feel like "initiates" in the sense of the text; like Tamino and Pamina, they have passed the tests, while we uninitiated skeptics, unable to get beyond the nonsense, have to stick to the low level of Papageno, who would not exchange the tangible material world for a vague promise of an ideal world, sight unseen. >>
From this it would seem that Goethe might agree with David's assertion that began this discussion, that the story is not comprehensible without the benefit of outside information. Then again, that might just be Hildesheimer's interpretation (or mine!).
mdl
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