Tag Archives: Opera

1997: Translation / Transformation

Posted on March 11, 2018 by

In a 1997 essay on translation, the writer Harry Mathews cites Marcel Benabou’s version of Keats’s “A thing of beauty is a joy forever”: Ah, singe débotté, / Hisse un jouet fort et vert! It’s not quite a translation: the … Continue reading →

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1935: Fixing her Hair

Posted on November 26, 2017 by

Serge Sudeikin: Fixing her Hair (Ruby Elzy in “Porgy and Bess,” 1935) (1935) (listen)

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1784: First Woman to Fly

Posted on August 18, 2017 by

On June 4, 1784, at the age of 19, a French opera singer named Élisabeth Thible became the first woman aeronaut in history by ascending in a hot air balloon in Lyon. A painter named M. Fleuranthad had been scheduled … Continue reading →

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1737: Anti-Depressant

Posted on June 22, 2017 by

     It has been often related, and generally believed, that Philip V King of Spain, being seized with a total dejection of spirits, which made him refuse to be shaved, and rendered him incapable of attending council or transacting affairs … Continue reading →

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