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Rethinking Britten This page intentionally left blank Rethinking Britten EDITED BY Philip Rupprecht 1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offi ces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Th ailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 © Oxford University Press 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Rethinking Britten / edited by Philip Rupprecht. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-979480-5 (hardback : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-19-979481-2 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Britten, Benjamin, 1913–1976—Criticism and interpretation. I. Rupprecht, Philip Ernst, editor. ML410.B853R47 2013 780.92—dc23 2013000218 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Contents Acknowledgments vii Contributors x i Introduction: Britten’s Music and Its Audiences x v philip rupprecht I Public and Private 1 O n Ambiguity in Britten 3 paul kildea 2 “ O Hurry to the Fêted Spot of Your Deliberate Fall”: Death in Britten, 1936–1940 2 0 stephen arthur allen 3 L ove Knots: Britten, Pears, and the Sonnet 40 lloyd whitesell II Opera 4 Peter Grimes and the “Tuneful Air” 6 3 arved ashby 5 P ost-War Women in Britten 8 6 j. p. e. harper-scott 6 B e Flat or Be Natural? Pitch Symbolism in Britten’s Operas 1 02 mervyn cooke III Post-War Encounters 7 B ritten and the Avant-Garde in the 1950s 131 philip rupprecht 8 Curlew River and Cultural Encounter 156 heather wiebe v vi Contents 9 B ritten’s Rhetoric of Resistance: Th e Works for Rostropovich 181 arnold whittall IV Late Modern 1 0 An Excess of Less? Britten’s Music of the Late 1960s 2 09 christopher mark 11 Animating O wen Wingrave : Ghosts and Global Television 237 danielle ward-griffin 12 Th e Dye-line Rehearsal Scores for D eath in Venice 262 christopher wintle Works Cited 287 Index 301 Acknowledgments Th e editor is grateful to his coauthors for their interest in contributing to this symposium, and particularly to Mervyn Cooke and Arnold Whittall for advice at the outset. At Oxford, Suzanne Ryan supported the proposal and off ered in- sightful guidance—sent, frequently, from her BlackBerry—as the book evolved. For helpful responses to many editorial questions, I am most grateful to Adam Cohen and Erica Woods Tucker. Tom Finnegan was the ideal copy editor. At the Britten-Pears Library in Aldeburgh, Nicholas Clark and Lucy Walker patiently and expertly responded to a range of archival queries. For valuable assistance at many other points, it is a pleasure to thank Jill Burrows, Jonathan Cross, Mary Francis, Alain Frogley, Elaine Gould, Ben Haas, Jessica Hogg, Michael L. Klein, Bruce MacRae, Gail O’Brien Stewart, Stephen Peles, Philip Reed, Caroline Rupprecht, Cathy Shuman, and Lee Sorensen. Music examples for Chapters 4, 7, 11, and 12 were set by Michael Trinastic. Quotations from the letters and other writings of Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears are copyright © the Britten-Pears Foundation. F igure 7 .1, the photograph of Britten rehearsing the “Slung Mugs,” is © Kurt Hutton 1958, and reproduced cour- tesy of the Britten-Pears Foundation (w ww.brittenpears.org) , ref: PHPN/11/1/7. Quotations from documents relating to the television production of Owen Wing- rave are used by kind permission of the BBC Written Archives Centre, Reading. I mages from the dye-line rehearsal scores of Britten’s opera D eath in Venice are reproduced by permission of the Trustees of the Britten-Pears Foundation, and by kind permission of the publishers, Faber Music Limited. Death in Venice , op. 88 Music by Benjamin Britten, © 1973, 1974, 1975 by Faber Music Limited Libretto by Myfanwy Piper, based on the short story by Th omas Mann, © 1973 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Curlew River , op. 71 Music by Benjamin Britten Libretto by William Plomer, based on the mediaeval Japanese Nō play Sumidagawa by Jūrō Motomasa © 1966 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. vii viii Acknowledgments Suite for Cello, op. 72 Music by Benjamin Britten © 1966 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Songs and Proverbs of William Blake , op. 74 Music by Benjamin Britten Texts by William Blake © 1965 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Th e Poet’s Echo , op. 76 Music by Benjamin Britten Russian texts by Alexander Pushkin English translation by Peter Pears © 1967 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Second Suite for Cello, op. 80 Music by Benjamin Britten © 1969 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Children’s Crusade , op. 82 Music by Benjamin Britten, © 1969, 1970 by Faber Music Limited Words by Bertolt Brecht, © 1969 by Stefan S. Brecht Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Owen Wingrave , op. 85 Music by Benjamin Britten Libretto by Myfanwy Piper, based on the short story by Henry James © 1970 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Acknowledgments ix Th ird Suite for Cello, op. 87 Music by Benjamin Britten © 1976 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved. Tema “Sacher” Music by Benjamin Britten © 1990 by Faber Music Limited Reproduced by kind permission of the publishers All rights reserved.
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