32 replies to this topic

[Mel Johnson]

Right, Grace, it's the guys with the Ys.  And now they're finding XXY and XYY matches - ain't science wonderful?

[Estelle]

This is getting really off-topic, but actually a lot of "weird" genotypes can occur, like X (Turner syndrom), XXY (Klinefelter syndrom), XXX (triplo-X), XYY (once called "gene of crime" because of an incorrectly made study but in fact many men have it and are perfectly normal physically and mentally...)

Also Mel, you wrote: "When that happened, I wondered what had happened to her to make her so bitter. "

Actually, when reading that nonsensical manifesto I had thought the same... And actually she didn't exactly had a wonderful childhood (sex abuse, being homeless at 15, prostitution...):
http://www.wikipedia...Valerie_Solanas
(of course I'm not saying that it's an excuse for what she did...)

There's a novel by Gautier called "La morte amoureuse" (literally the "dead woman in love")
but I've never read it- pmeja, perhaps it's one of the novelettes you mentioned?

[Farrell Fan]

I wish someone would revive Puccini's first opera, "Le Villi," (The Wilis), some day, even if only in concert form. I'd love to hear what singing Wilis sound like. I gather that the plot owes a lot to Giselle, except that unlike Giselle, Anna, abandoned by Roberto, makes no effort to save him from the dance of death.

[Alexandra]

Sometimes second thoughts are best.  Go Anna!  

[grace]

thank you, estelle, for a terribly sad link, which shocked even me... sorry alexandra, to post again about something unrelated to Wilis, but this will be brief, i promise: estelle, i am curious - did you read her writing in french, or in english? i am just curious as to the possibility, which you suggest, that it was translated?...and i find it odd that you seem to know who she is - although maybe that is only after you looked up her name, online? i assume you are what i would consider 'too young' to know about such things !!! (that is, under 40). i also am amazed at her birthdate - for such a strident feminist who gained notoriety in the hippie 60's : she was born in 1936 - like my MOTHER! thank you for the link, estelle. i appreciated reading it.

[Estelle]

grace, I didn't suggest it was translated   I just said "nonsensical" because it's hard for me to take such a  manifest seriously (and I had read it in English). Well, I'm 28, but someone had mentioned her name and manifesto in a discussion on a French feminist forum, and so I had looked it up on the web and had come across that biography, that's all

Farrell Fan, thanks for the information about Puccini's opera. Do you know if Puccini knew about "Giselle", or if it was just a coincidence that he used the theme of the Wilis too? And actually it makes me think about Robbins' "The Cage"...

[Mel Johnson]

What I was getting at was that I knew Val casually in the Village scene in '66.  We traveled in sort of parallel cyclones.  She hadn't seemed angry about men in general, but she had it in for certain ones, like Allen Ginsburg and Peter Orlofsky.

[Farrell Fan]

Estelle --  both Puccini and the librettest, Ferdinando Fontana, were familiar with the ballet. The opera, which premiered in 1884, was originally in one act, but was revised and expanded into two later that same year. It apparently had a modest success, and the composer was regarded as "promising." The Harper Dictionary of Opera & Operetta calls the plot "inspired by a folk-legend and, possibly, by Adam's ballet Giselle to which the story bears more than a passing resemblance." The setting is the Black Forest.

[Estelle]

Thanks for the information, Farrell Fan. Was it performed again after 1884?

[Farrell Fan]

Estelle, according to my very old "Complete Opera Book," by Gustav Kobbe, published in 1919, "Le Villi" was actually performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1908. (The 1884 premiere had been in Milan, at the Dal Verme Theatre, not La Scala.) At the Metropolitan, the leading roles were sung by Frances Alda (a renowned soprano of the time, originally from New Zealand), the tenor Alessandro Bonci, and the great baritone Pasquale Amato, in the role of Anna's vengeful father. (Amato later originated the role of Jack Rance, the sheriff in Puccini's Fanciulla del West.)

The aforementioned "Harper Dictionary of Opera & Operetta," published in 1989, says that "Le Villi" "is still occasionally performed." I would love to be present at such an occasion. I don't know of any recordings.

[grace]

thanks for the information, estelle and mel. yes, mel - i thought you seemed to be implying at least having met the ...umm ... err ... "lady?". glad she didn't have it in for *YOU*!   enough said on this topic.

[CalMia]

In adding to the topic of the "Wilis". I have a new Question, I understand that Myrtha is supposed to be the queen of all the Wilis, but why, I assume that she like the rest, died of a broken heart, but what makes her the queen?, why is she so extra bitter???     Why do all the other wilis do what she tells them?

[Mel Johnson]

Originally, the Wilis were to reflect something of their former selves in terms of costumes and choreographic material, Moyna and Zulma were to have been a bayadére and a Gypsy/Hungarian, respectively, or was it the other way 'round?  Myrtha, whose name is derived from "Martha" (Hebrew: "the lady of the house") was to have been royalty who had suffered death from a broken heart as a result of a fiancé's faithlessness.  So, apparently, undeath does not level ranks.

[carbro]

Mel Johnson, on Jul 23 2003, 06:22 AM, said:

Moyna and Zulma were to have been a bayadére and a Gypsy/Hungarian, respectively, or was it the other way 'round?

Wow!  That is a most intriguing tidbit.  Thanks, Mel!

[grace]

mel, can you just clarify what you mean by "originally"- i.e. what source you are referring to? as carbro says, a fascinating tidbit...