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Sunday, September 4, 2011

KENNAN REFERENCES RE FLEDERMAUS AND COVENT GARDEN PRODUCTION

"If we could afford to preserve an opera-bouffe political system, in which everything was taken in the spirit of Strauss' 'Fledermaus,' I should be the last person to oppose anything which could add so materially to the humor of it as our type of amateurism in government.......But if death, torture and misery are not laughing matters, then neither is political life in these times; for death, torture and misery have become the penalties of political failure."


Kennan's Manuscript Part I, pp. 11-12, Kennan Papers.


I admit to enjoying the 1984 version, done at the Royal Opera House many years ago with Kiri Te Kanawa, Hildegaard Heichele ( Behrens ), Hermann Prey, Benjamin Luxon, Doris Soffel, Merle Park, Wayne Eagling, Charles Aznavour, Domingo cond., etc., 


a production which the Daily Telegraph quite rightly dubbed a summit of escapism, even then.


Term search: Fledermaus, life and death 


(Also, think Texas versus Massachusetts, re Romney Perry state sectoral faux issue, term search: your state, Lorch, etc.)

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