Opera in the Novel from Balzac to Proust

by Cormac Newark

Overview

The turning point of Madame Bovary, which Flaubert memorably set at the opera, is only the most famous example of a surprisingly long tradition, one common to a range of French literary styles and sub-genres. In the first book-length study of that tradition to appear in English, Cormac Newark examines representations of operatic performance from Balzac's La Comédie humaine to Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu, by way of (among others) Dumas père's Le Comte de Monte-Cristo and Leroux's Le Fantôme de l'Opéra. Attentive to textual and musical detail alike in the works, the study also delves deep into their reception contexts. The result is a compelling cultural-historical account: of changing ways of making sense of operatic experience from the 1820s to the 1920s, and of a perennial writerly fascination with the recording of that experience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521118903
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/31/2011
Series:	Cambridge Studies in Opera
Pages:	298
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Cormac Newark has published widely on nineteenth-century French and Italian opera: his work has appeared in 19th-Century Music, the Cambridge Opera Journal and the Journal of the Royal Musical Association, and in various collections of essays. He has also written for Opera magazine and the Guardian. He currently teaches at the University of Ulster.

Table of Contents

Introduction; 1. Balzac, Meyerbeer and science; 2. 'Tout entier?': scenes from grand opéra in Dumas and Balzac; 3. The novel in opera: residues of reading in Flaubert; 4. Knowing what happens next: opera in Verne; 5. 'Vous qui faites l'endormie': the Phantom and the buried voices of the Paris Opéra; 6. Proust and the soirée à l'Opéra chez soi; Envoi; Bibliography.

Editorial Reviews

'With an obvious and informed enthusiasm for the subject, Newark balances literary and musicological considerations with quite and persuasive authority … casts revealing light on a significant period in the development of opera.' Opera

From the Publisher