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Robert le Diable: The Facsimile
Author: Giacomo Meyerbeer
Date Of Publication: Apr 2005
Isbn13: 9781904303435
Isbn: 1-904303-43-9
Writing to Meyerbeer in 1837 in the eleventh of her famous Lettres d’un voyageur, George Sand observed of the opera Robert le Diable: “. . .Though you are a musician, you are more a poet than any of us!... It was not long ago that you were on your knees in the sensuous darkness of Saint Mark’s constructing your Sicilian cathedral on a scale even more vast, smothering yourself in Catholic incense at that dark hours when the candles are lit, making the gold and marble walls sparkle until you were overcome and bowed down by the tender and terrible ecstasies of that holy place....You have pieced the impenetrable silence of the tombs and...heard the bitter lamentation of the damned and the threats of the angels of darkness. You have grasped the hidden significance and sublime sorrow of all those strange and sombre allegories. Between the angel and the devil, between the fantastic heaven and hell of the Middle Ages, you have seen man divided against himself, torn between the flesh and the spirit...You have depicted these struggles, these fears and torments, these promises and raptures in solemn, touching strokes, while leaving them cloaked in their poetic symbols...” These vivid words, written six years after the triumphant production of Robert le Diable, admirably sum up the power and impact of this important work, the principal operatic expression of French Romanticism. Its première on 21 November 1831 was one of the most sensational in the annals of opera, and its success throughout the nineteenth century universal and enduring. Not only did the composer sum up the various impulses of the splendid French lyrico-dramatic tradition of grand opéra, and introduce widely influential, structural, melodic and orchestral ideas into general operatic currency, but he seemed to address the very soul and aspiration of the people of his age. The opera based on a legend, became a legend in its own right. The facsimile edition of the manuscript of this famous work, for so long kept private and then thought lost after the Second World War, enables lovers of opera to examine for themselves the compositional procedure of its great and often misunderstood creator. The admired pieces like Bertram’s Évocation, Isabelle’s cavatina of grace, the sensational Ballet of the Nuns in the ruins of a moonlit cloister, the decisive trio of redemption in the last act, can all be seen at their very inception. Meyerbeer produced a work “that changed the face of opera” (William J. Collins). The full significance of this score in the history of opera must still be properly assessed.
Robert Letellier is a Meyerbeer scholar who has published extensively, including a four volume English version of the composer’s diaries.
Price Uk Gbp: 79.99
Price Us Usd: 119.99
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From Kerouac Ascending: Memorabilia of the Decade of On the Road
“Katherine Burkman, best known for her contributions to Harold Pinter, Samuel Beckett, and modern drama studies in general, now provides an essential reference for students of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and the beats through this memoir by Elbert Lenrow. A beloved teacher at the New School for Social Research, Lenrow met and taught Jack Kerouac in the late forties, befriending him and Allen Ginsberg as well. The book offers unprecedented insight into the beats in general and Kerouac’s development as a writer, thinker, and cultural force in American literature. Howard Cunnell, who introduces the book, notes that through his friendship with Kerouac, ‘Lenrow got to ride in what would become the most famous car in modern American literature.’ And thanks to this book, now readers of Kerouac Ascending do, too.”
—Ann C. Hall, Professor, Ohio Dominican University; President, Harold Pinter Society
“The larger significance of the sustained and sustaining friendship between Elbert Lenrow and Kerouac and Ginsberg in this book is that it exhibits Jack and Allen in ways that are seldom, if ever, represented in accounts of their lives. As a bonus, from this fine, small book, the reader can acquire an enriched and enhanced understanding of the multifarious political, literary, and artistic relationships of virtually all the principal players in the cultural scene in the mid- to late 20th century.”
—James L. Battersby, Professor Emeritus of English, Ohio State University
“Always their affectionate elder, Lenrow presents Kerouac and Ginsberg mostly in their own words, making no broad claim or judgments beyond the recognition that both writers spoke for their time as Walt Whitman did for his and that they have become iconic figures for a literary movement. It is a modest but important work presenting original materials saved by a gentle, sensitive, and literate man.”
—Mark S. Auburn, Professor Emeritus of English, former Senior Vice President and Provost at the University of Akron
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