Is opera a kind of literature?

[JBI]

Hmm in terms of Opera excerpts, one cannot go wrong with Senta's Ballad from The Flying Dutchman by Wagner.

[Brasil]

Original version (Portuguese)
Passar uma tarde em Itapoan
Ao sol que arde em Itapoan
Ouvindo o mar de Itapoan
Falar de amor Itapoan

English translation
Spending an afternoon in Itapoan
Bellow the sun that burns in Itapoan
Listening to the sea of Itapoan
Speaking of love Itapoan

Obs: Itapoan is a Brazilian beach

Obs: See the internal rhyme inside the original version.

By Toquinho (music) and Vinicius de Moraes (poem)
Bossa Nova rhythm

[stlukesguild]

I've been thinking on this question... and on the related issue of the "poetic" merits of songs... and I find that in most cases the librettos or the lyrics simply just do not stand up on their own... as works of literature... but they were not meant to. A good poem or even a work of prose has a "music" all its own... a certain pacing... a certain flow... a beauty to the language... a multifaceted or multi-layeredness that exists within the words themselves. When one merges text with music we have a whole other art form. Lyrics are given a rhythm or structure that they may lack when taken on their own. The success of the expression of emotion, drama, even level of meanings changes when married to music. Schubert's Winterreise is arguably his greatest achievement in the genre of lieder or art song (and Schubert himself is the greatest composer of the same). Where other lieder were composed to poems of Goethe and other major German lyric poets, this work set a cycle of poems by the minor German poet, Wilhelm Müller, to music. The poems are unremarkable on their own... but through Schubert's music they are endowed with an extraordinary tension... emotion... passion... beauty. The same holds true for most works which combine music and words. Puccini's librettos taken on their own are among the absolute worst... often based upon the latest trashy popular novels. It is the music which raises these to such a level. Certainly the words are part of the experience... but the music raises them well above what they offer on their own. In a manner this is not unlike the manner in which a great film maker can take a mediocre work of literature and turn it into a magnificent film... while a mediocre film maker can just as easily butcher the most masterful work of literature. Film, opera, lieder, paintings, Gothic cathedrals, etc... are all unique art forms to be taken as a whole... not split into parts and portions.

[slobone]

I can see from your comments about Puccini that you don't know much about him. Manon Lescaut was based on a classic French novel, La Boheme on a well-loved one. Neither was a recent work by a long shot. Turandot was based on an 18th century commedia del'arte play, via an adaptation by Schiller. Tosca was based on a play by Sardou, which gave Sarah Bernhardt one of her signature roles. Madama Butterfly and La Fanciulla del West were based on plays by David Belasco, which while quite popular weren't particularly trashy.

And anyway, if you find Puccini's operas trashy, I suggest you avoid A Streetcar Named Desire, Macbeth, and Oedipus Rex... not to mention The Sound and the Fury, Lolita, or Madame Bovary.

[JCamilo]

I've been thinking on this question... and on the related issue of the "poetic" merits of songs... and I find that in most cases the librettos or the lyrics simply just do not stand up on their own... as works of literature... but they were not meant to. A good poem or even a work of prose has a "music" all its own... a certain pacing... a certain flow... a beauty to the language... a multifaceted or multi-layeredness that exists within the words themselves. When one merges text with music we have a whole other art form. Lyrics are given a rhythm or structure that they may lack when taken on their own. The success of the expression of emotion, drama, even level of meanings changes when married to music. Schubert's Winterreise is arguably his greatest achievement in the genre of lieder or art song (and Schubert himself is the greatest composer of the same). Where other lieder were composed to poems of Goethe and other major German lyric poets, this work set a cycle of poems by the minor German poet, Wilhelm Müller, to music. The poems are unremarkable on their own... but through Schubert's music they are endowed with an extraordinary tension... emotion... passion... beauty. The same holds true for most works which combine music and words. Puccini's librettos taken on their own are among the absolute worst... often based upon the latest trashy popular novels. It is the music which raises these to such a level. Certainly the words are part of the experience... but the music raises them well above what they offer on their own. In a manner this is not unlike the manner in which a great film maker can take a mediocre work of literature and turn it into a magnificent film... while a mediocre film maker can just as easily butcher the most masterful work of literature. Film, opera, lieder, paintings, Gothic cathedrals, etc... are all unique art forms to be taken as a whole... not split into parts and portions.

That is my whole point, when we try to imply that a given art manifestation is literature, such we are doing with Music (This thread about Opera is not the only one) we are being arrogant and doing a historical mistake. We imply that Music is a derivation of literature, when we know Music existence predates literature existence for god's know how long and that Literature is the one originated from oral experiences (Music included).
Music does not need to be Literature, it is Music and this is enough. We do not need to validate everything by calling it literature.
So, when we got the writen part of a form of Music, and put apart, lot will be lost (just like a movie script does not stand by itself as it is intended to be completed by the acting, photography, music, etc), even when it is a good song writer behind it.

As for being poetry, if we consider, which is only fair, that poetry is some short of language manipulation, then anytime we have the language being used - oral or writen - we can have poetry, not just when talking about literature.

[slobone]

Stlukesguild, I'm not picking on you personally, but I wanted to add a couple more thoughts on Puccini.

Puccini, along with the other verismo composers, was attacked in his day for the subject matter of his operas (although I don't think the attacks could have been very effective, since all these operas were monster hits.) Some of this may have been due to the fact that lower-class characters were being shown in a serious light for the first time. (Previously, servants, peasants, and so forth were used only as comic relief.)

You'd think that charge would have been defused by now. But then Joseph Kerman, a modern American critic, famously called Tosca a "shabby little shocker." He couldn't have been complaining about the social status of the characters, since Scarpia, Cavaradossi, and Angelotti are all noblemen, and Tosca herself is a celebrated diva who's a personal friend of the Queen (of Naples).

Presumably he's complaining about the torture scene in Act II (though the actual torture takes place offstage). But let's look at what goes on in some other famous operas, shall we?

Die Walküre -- incest
Elektra -- matricide
Salomé -- nude dancing by a minor, vaticide
Rigoletto -- rape (a good lawyer might be able to plead it down to stat rape)
Don Giovanni -- serial attempted rape
Così fan tutte -- mate-swapping
Marriage of Figaro -- sexual harassment of employees
Il Trovatore -- infanticide
Faust -- demonic possession, illegitimacy, infanticide
Oedipus Rex (Stravinsky) -- don't get me started

And that's without going into Lulu or Wozzeck...

Somehow it all sounds more like the Jerry Springer show than an event that's often attended by the most glittering and respectable segment of society.

[stlukesguild]

I can see from your comments about Puccini that you don't know much about him. Manon Lescaut was based on a classic French novel, La Boheme on a well-loved one. Neither was a recent work by a long shot. Turandot was based on an 18th century commedia del'arte play, via an adaptation by Schiller. Tosca was based on a play by Sardou, which gave Sarah Bernhardt one of her signature roles. Madama Butterfly and La Fanciulla del West were based on plays by David Belasco, which while quite popular weren't particularly trashy.

And anyway, if you find Puccini's operas trashy, I suggest you avoid A Streetcar Named Desire, Macbeth, and Oedipus Rex... not to mention The Sound and the Fury, Lolita, or Madame Bovary.

Ah... my mistake. I didn't realize that Henri Murger's La Vie de Bohème, David Belasco's The Girl of the Golden West, John Luther Long's Madame Butterfly, or Victorien Sardou's Tosca were on the same level as Faulkner, Sophocles, Nabokov, or Flaubert. Of course there is Turandot, right? An adaption by Friederich Schiller (don't remember it ever mentioned under Schiller's major contributions) of a play by Carlo Gozzi which was itself further adapted by the librettists, Giuseppe Adami and Renato Simoni.

A word of advice... do not underestimate someone that you know but very little of. I am more than a little familiar with Puccini. He may be my favorite 20th century composer (and I'll call him a 20th century composer because more of his major works were composed from 1900 onward than before) after Richard Strauss. He built upon Wagner's concepts of the musical motif and the continuous flow (as opposed to the recitative, aria, recitative, duet... structure) bringing it a wonderfully lush melodic quality. In spite of this he has been repeatedly criticized for his excessive focus on melody, his overly romantic lushness, his popular appeal, and his lack of "seriousness". Of course the same criticisms were directed at Rachmaninoff and I disagree in both instances. Unfortunately, the criticisms stuck for years, and for quite a while Puccini's works were seen as nothing but light entertainments by many in the music world. Maria Callas has been credited by many as one of the first to endow these works were a level of seriousness... emotion... and passion that was due.

Nevertheless... I certainly find that the criticisms directed at his choices of literary source material are not without merit. None of his librettos will stand upon their own as works of literature. Of course, this is true of almost all operas... with the exceptions of Wagner's and Hofmannsthal's libretto's for Strauss. Again... I don't know that I would call this a "flaw". There are any number of great films based upon mediocre (or worse) plays/stories/novels. There are endless paintings paintings based upon similar mediocre literary sources. We don't measure these art works by dissecting them or dividing them into parts, but rather as a whole.

Puccini, along with the other verismo composers, was attacked in his day for the subject matter of his operas (although I don't think the attacks could have been very effective, since all these operas were monster hits.) Some of this may have been due to the fact that lower-class characters were being shown in a serious light for the first time. (Previously, servants, peasants, and so forth were used only as comic relief.)

Whether the works were hits or not I feel has very little to due with the validity of criticism. Harry Potter and The DaVinci Code were blockbusters that continue to sell phenomenally well. This doesn't belie the criticism that they are but mediocre entertainment. Puccini was a great composer. Almsost none of the authors of his literary source material or his librettos are even close to his level artistically. How many do we still read today outside of the context of Puccini's operas? In a way, this makes his achievement even more impressive, when we consider what he was able to create from such a mediocre source... perhaps not unlike Peter Paul Rubens great cycle of paintings praising the life of Marie De Medici... who had essentially done nothing with her life outside of virtually bankrupt the nation of France. But critics will always wonder "what if?" What might he have achieved with material more worthy of his talents?

But let's look at what goes on in some other famous operas, shall we?

Die Walküre -- incest
Elektra -- matricide
Salomé -- nude dancing by a minor, vaticide
Rigoletto -- rape (a good lawyer might be able to plead it down to stat rape)
Don Giovanni -- serial attempted rape
Così fan tutte -- mate-swapping
Marriage of Figaro -- sexual harassment of employees
Il Trovatore -- infanticide
Faust -- demonic possession, illegitimacy, infanticide
Oedipus Rex (Stravinsky) -- don't get me started

And that's without going into Lulu or Wozzeck...

You are mistaking my comments upon the "trashy" source materials for a suggestion that there are appropriate or inappropriate themes in art... this in spite of the fact that I have suggested on more than one occasion that the whole of art can almost be reduced to meditations upon sex and death (with a few exceptions). Yes... there are some dirty little goings-on happening in just about every opera... but you miss the fact that almost every opera you list above was based on a literary source of real merit (Salomé-The Bible/Oscar Wilde, Elektra- Sophocles, Euripides, Giraudoux, Hofmannsthal, Lulu- Frank Wedekind, Faust... do we really need to trace that? Every one of these literary sources are works of art that stand upon their own. It would seem a valid criticism to ask why an artist would not choose to work with a source material of the greatest quality... but again... it all comes down to the end result. I doubt I'll be ever reading any of Puccini's source materials... (and I actually own a copy of John Luther Long's Madame Butterfly) but I will continue to enjoy Puccini's operas.

[stlukesguild]

Music does not need to be Literature, it is Music and this is enough. We do not need to validate everything by calling it literature.

It often seems that we break down the whole of ART into three distinct categories: (Visual) Art, Music, and Literature. The reality is that the arts are far more complex than this. A play by Shakespeare is one work of art. It is a magnificent work of literature. A theatrical performance of the same play is a second work of art altogether. It employs Shakespeare's text but adds the acting, stage sets, direction, costume, etc... A film of the same play is still another beast again. It includes the text, the acting, the staging, music, direction, costume, cinematography, special effects, etc... A great many works of art combine multiple disciplines or cross disciplines. In some instances the individual parts stand as brilliant works on their own. For example... William Blake's Illuminated books can stand on their own as works of visual art... or as literature. On the other hand there are (for example) marvelous examples of the book as an art form such as Aldus Manutius' Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, which stand as marvelous examples of book binding, printing, letter type and page design, and illustration... but the actual work as literature doesn't stand on its own. I agree with the JCamilo's statement: "We do not need to validate everything by calling it literature." Each art form should be looked at for what it is... not dissected and judged for what it isn't or what it was never intended to be.

[slobone]

Stlukesguild -- I tried hard to figure out a way to tell you that my last post was not directed at you personally. The fact that you chose to misinterpret me tips me off that you're one of those Internet people who loves pissing contests -- which I don't. So this will be the last time I respond to you.

[Brasil]

For me, this lyrics by John Lennon are literature too:

I- Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
Strawberry Fields forever.

II- Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out.
It doesn't matter much to me.

repeat I

III- No one I think is in my tree, I mean it must be high or low.
That is you can't you know tune in but it's all right.
That is I think it's not too bad.

repeat I

IV- Always no sometimes think it's me, but you know I know when it's a dream.
I think I know I mean "Yes," but it's all wrong.
That is I think I disagree.

repeat I

[stlukesguild]

slobone- The fact that you chose to misinterpret me tips me off that you're one of those Internet people who loves pissing contests -- which I don't.

Ah... a "pissing contest" is it? Let's make a brief review:

Someone (not even myself) posts a comment about the literary merits of Puccini's librettos:

JBI-Puccini's libretti all seem to be mediocre at best (he had a love of taking popular pulp fiction and turning it into an opera)

You offered a contrary opinion: "I think Puccini's librettos are among the greatest ever written (he usually employed whole teams of writers to do them, and he was very demanding.) You can't beat his operas for tightness of pacing, for capturing a character or an emotion in just a few words."

While musing upon the topic at hand I offered my own opinion... in line with that of the first poster: "Puccini's librettos taken on their own are among the absolute worst... often based upon the latest trashy popular novels. It is the music which raises these to such a level. Certainly the words are part of the experience... but the music raises them well above what they offer on their own."

For this audacious act I earned the following comment:

slobone- I can see from your comments about Puccini that you don't know much about him.

To this you added another posting begining: "Stlukesguild, I'm not picking on you personally, but I wanted to add a couple more thoughts on Puccini..." followed by a a series of arguments intended as proof of your opinion... and one might presume evidence of my own ignorance about the topic at hand. Fine with me. Well and good. The primary reason I engage in such internet forums is for the dialog... even when such leads to disagreement. Such disagreements, after all, can force me to think about my position... to clarify my thoughts... perhaps even to rethink or re-evaluate my position in light of strong arguments contrary to my own initial thoughts.

I then offered a post in which I countered your arguments... not once suggesting that I underestimate you or your knowledge of Puccini... to which I earned the final response branding me as one of "those types" who likes to engage in internet "pissing contests". So no one may question your opinions? So anyone else's competency or knowledge may be freely questioned... but if they dare to counter these comments they may be easily dismissed as "one of those internet people... etc..."? Obviously I have the wrong idea as to why we are here and as to what educated discussion and debate is all about. Then you announce in closing... taking the obvious high road, no doubt... "this will be the last time I respond to you."

Ah! me! I'm deeply wounded!

[stlukesguild]

For me, this lyrics by John Lennon are literature too:

I- Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
Strawberry Fields forever.

II- Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out.
It doesn't matter much to me.

repeat I... etc...


Can you honestly read this and find it to be a well written poem without the benefit of music? Honestly? Personally I still like the Beatles in spite of the fact that I tend to listen far more to classical music... but this in no way is a good "poem".

[Brasil]

How do you define a good poem?

What is good and what is bad?

What is literature?

And more: What is art?

Would Salvador Dali's pictures be seen as art if his pictures were made at the same period of Leonardo Da Vinci?

Would exist Picasso out off his own historic context?

What is classical music?
That's why I love eastern culture, western culture is full of labels!

[JBI]

Eastern culture isn't full of labels? Have you read any Eastern poetry? the 5 line Tankas of Japan usually contain at least one allusion. All their aesthetic labeling seems to be rooted in classical texts, to the point that if you check their references in poetry (meaning where their sense of metaphor comes from), everything seems to be emulating this 6 line excerpt from a poem I believe called "The Bride"(I haven't read my anthologies of Chinese verse in a while), which set the president for the entire Chinese aesthetic code, and the subsequent Japanese code.

Eastern poetry, whether Arabian, Chinese, Korean, Indian, Persian, or Japanese (or anything else in between) has the same labels as Western poetry. Each country has developed its own forms, the same way English, and French, and the West in general have. Each culture has created also, its own canon. Labels exist there too, genres exist there too, and classical reverence exists their too. Memorizing poems is part of the Japanese school program, where kids are supposed to have memorized I think it is 100 of the major canonical works. Poetry was written in closed forms there too, and with aesthetic expectations there too.

Salvador Dali also, as you try to presume, would not have drawn the same thing in the period of Leonardo Da Vinci. He was subject to influences, the same way Leonardo would not have painted the same way if he lived in the Medieval times, and the Medieval painter would not have painted the same way, had he lived in Antiquity.

The period is essential to the art work, and what comes before or after.

Classical music is rooted in that concept, in the sense that it is a selection of the best written in a specific time period (Bach, Handel etc. - Baroque, Haydn, Mozart etc. - Classical, Beethoven, Wagner etc - Romantic). What classical music is, essentially, is a selection of the greatest pieces written spanning from the renaissance to the almost present.

By the way, the East as well has a classical music Canon, with the same labeling.

You ask what is good and bad? Nothing, I don't believe in that as a judge of literature, to quote Oscar Wilde:

Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only Beauty.

That being said, one may find beautiful things in beautiful music. One can at the same time find mediocre lyrics with beautiful music, and mediocre music with beautiful lyrics.

Your argument, that you seem to be pasting in every post, in every thread, that taste is relative, and not objective is true enough. Some of us have good taste, some of us have bad taste. That doesn't mean the quality of art, however, is subjective, merely that some readers (listeners?) do not have the insight/desire/strength to acknowledge beauty when they are presented with it, and merely replace "taste" with personal ideology, or idiosyncratic preference.

[Brasil]

I was not talking about eastern poetry, but eastern philosophy.
Literature is not the only source of knowledge I know.
I don't know if you read philosophy, but maybe if you knew more about eastern philosophy, you would understand my ironic commentary.
For the eastern philosophers, to nominate something is ignorance. If someone want to know something, must discard labels. The philosophers did not have even a name for god.

You only gave the answers I already know. But sometimes I pretend unknownledge to make a "Socratic Irony". That makes you confess:

"Some of us have good taste, some of us have bad taste"
- And you want to make me belive that kind of thinking is not a belief in superiority?


"That doesn't mean the quality of art, however, is subjective"
- That is the point, quality is a totally subjective concept. It depends of the time (in history) and space (in geographical postition).
That's why Picasso could not be seen as a great painter if he was born in Ancient Greece, for example. The taste, the quality, was totally different from the XX century.
That's why a modernist poet could not be seen as a great writer if he was born in Medieval Times, for example. The taste, the quality, was totally different from the XX century.
The concept of art is always changing from period to period.
Some survive (Dante, Shakespeare, Beethoven, Leonardo) and they were great (still are) but that does not mean Beethoven is a influence to hip hop "musicians", or Shakespeare is the basis of modern literature.
So, opera or rock, Shakespeare or Machado, Dali or Da Vinci...each art has his own value (even the art you do not consider art because of your personal taste).
Maybe, there are people here that think hip hop is a poor art. But not for the ghetto people. For them, hip hop is most important than Mozart. Who am I (and who are you) to say the opposite?