The story is told from the Vitcomte de Chagny-Raoul’s perspective. There is an amazingly talented opera singer named Christine Daae. Raoul and Christine were childhood friends. When they were kids, Christine's scarf was swept into the sea in Peros, France by the wind. Raoul retrieved it for her and they were friends ever since. They remained friends until the death of Christine’s father. Before his death, her father told her and Raoul a story about the “Angel of Music”, how this angel taught little Lott how to sing. Christine’s father promised her the Angel would visit her too. Both of Christine’s parents are dead at this point, so she went to stay with a close family friend, Mamma Valèrius, as she was still young. Christine stayed with Mamma …show more content…
Erik is the infamous phantom of the opera. He is really a deformed man, who lived in the cellar of the opera house. He was embarrassed of his deformity so he is usually masked and mysterious. Every night he comes to the opera house to watch the plays. He shows up halfway through the second act and always sits in box 5. In fact, the administration of the opera reserves box 5 specifically for the opera ghost. Playing on this “Angel of Music” he begins to give Christine singing lessons. He falls in love with her, however the feeling is not mutual. He is possessive and thirty-something years older than her. He begins sending threatening messages to the opera administration/performers. In the performance of “Faust” a singer by the name of Carlotta was supposed to be the lead. The administration received a letter from “O.G.” (opera ghost) demanding Christine replace Carlotta. Later Carlotta receives a similar letter saying “If you appear to-night, you must be prepared for a great misfortune at the moment when you open your mouth to sing...a misfortune worse than death.” Carlotta went on and sang anyway and completely lost her voice in the middle of her performance. This unfortunately is not the worst thing that happened. The chandelier hanging over the audience fell, killing a member of the audience. This seemed to be a common theme: Erik demands something and if his demands are not met, someone dies or some tragedy
Marie had just traveled from her hometown of Ville Rose, where discarding your child made you wicked, to the city of Port-Au-Prince, where children are commonly left on the street. Marie finds a child that she thinks could not be more beautiful, “I thought she was a gift from Heaven when I saw her on the dusty curb, wrapped in a small pink blanket, a few inches away from a sewer as open as a hungry child’s yawn” (79). Marie has suffered many miscarriages, so she takes this child as if it were her own, “I swayed her in my arms like she was and had always been mine” (82). Marie’s hope for a child has paid off, or so it seems. Later, it is revealed that the child is, in fact, dead, and Marie fabricated a story to sanction her hopes and distract her from the harsh reality of her life, “I knew I had to act with her because she was attracting flies and I was keeping her spirit from moving on… She smelled so bad that I couldn’t even bring myself to kiss her without choking on my breath” (85). Her life is thrown back into despair as her cheating husband accuses her of killing children for evil purposes and sends her to
The Breton lai, Milun is the ninth among twelve lais in the collected works known famously as the Lais of Marie de France. It is a narrative about a courtly love and family bond that become divided by an overpowering marital system. Written in England, the lai of the legendary medieval poet, Marie de France, can be traced back to the 12th century. Virtually nothing is known of the writer. Any information identified, including her name and geographical background, has been discovered through her manuscripts. While her poems focus primarily on the observance of love, distinctiveness of each character, and vibrancy of words, Marie’s lai, Milun, had a sense of realism involved that impacted me personally. The fictional tale corresponds to my life in a meaningful way that made me feel connected to the female character in the story. Marie’s style of writing provoked me to respond through my own life experiences and emotions of loving secretively, mothering a child, and the pain of separation.
It holds such power over captives and captors alike that they cannot help but feel enamoured to the life it brings. Cesar especially feels the beauty of music “Oh, how he loved to hear the words in his mouth… It didn't matter that he didn't understand the language, he knew what it meant. The words and music fused together and became a part of him” and through music, he discovers his latent talent for singing (224). Based only on Roxanne’s previous arias, Cesar’s potential is outstandingly bright when he sings for the first time without any training whatsoever. Not only do the others learn to appreciate his gift, but Roxanne herself recognizes how promising he is or she would not have bothered to waste her time tutoring him. Beforehand, Cesar is nothing remarkable, just another one of the terrorists who detains them, but the opera transforms him into a separate person. Like the mansion enveloped in the garua, Cesar is heavily shrouded by serious self-esteem issues and fear, but after his breakthrough, his worries suddenly disappear and his life becomes a reservoir of joy. If “life, true life, was something stored in music”, then Cesar has lived a deprived life; his passion for music was just unfolding, but fate robs the world of who “was meant to be the greatest singer of his time” (5,
McGee, Timothy J. Medieval and Renaissance Music: A Performer’s Guide. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985.
Opera is a unique genre of spoken word and song accompanied by music. The music takes one through ascending and descending ranges of emotions. Mozart's Don Giovanni is a perfect example of how this genre emits a wide variety of feelings and attitudes. This "dark comedy seems to convey Mozart's feeling that events have both comical and serious dimensions…" (Kerman, 205). The opera, as a whole, is neither exclusively comedic nor entirely tragic.
A Short History of Opera: 4th Edition. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Simon, Henry W. 100 Great Operas and Their Stories. New York: Penguin Books, 1994 New York: Anchor Books, 1989. Osborne, Charles.
Whether physical or figurative, death adds a new dimension to Othello and A Doll House. Its presence gives the reader an eerie feeling and intensifies the depth of the plays. As readers, we wonder about the significance of death, and muse over what went on in the heads of Nora and, especially, Othello during the moment of truth. Nora believed in the illusion, whereas Othello was fooled into believing in it. They both went through a transformation, a step higher in consciousness, to a new beginning. Death is a link in the chain of life. Death as change or demise is often feared, because one doesn’t know what to expect. It is said that the best way to banish an enemy is to make it a friend. The concept of death, if understood, will unleash immortality.
Christine, being the heroine and the love interest of both leading men, is portrayed as an ideal woman because she upholds the expected feminine gender roles in our culture: delicate, naïve, indecisive, and helpless. Her delicacy is displayed when she faints in the Phantom’s lair, and the Phantom has to carry her. It is clear that this adds to her overall appeal to the Phantom because he feels needed and important—something that rarely happens to him. Because Christine becomes more appealing to the Phantom when she is weak and helpless, that supports the gender normative roles of females. In addition, Christine blindly believed that this voice was the angel of music that her father sent to her, and that added to her innocence. Christine accepted that idea so easily, making her seem naïve, which helps to support the stereotype of women. In general, Christine is more appealing when she needs a man help, those character traits exemplify the gender ideals for females, and the Phantom’s interactions with her confirm that.
Of Shakespeare’s five greatest tragedies, Othello is by far the most passionate and gripping. It is a tale of love, deception, evil, honesty, and virtue. Othello himself is set apart from other Shakespearean tragic heroes by the absolute feeling of affection the audience feels for him even unto the very end of the play. Any discerning reader painfully recognizes the virtue and goodness of Othello throughout the entire play, in contrast to the general degeneration of character so typical of a tragic hero. It is this complete pity that makes the death of Othello so tragic as the audience lends their full hopeful support until the inevitable and unavoidable fall. The evil side of Othello’s tragic flaw came from without, in the form of Iago. The internal flaw exists only in his heartrendingly unshakable goodness and honor.
Shakespeare’s Othello consists of the themes betrayal, love and dishonesty. At the centre of this play is the tragic downfall of Othello at the hands of his so called friend Iago. In this essay I will be discussing the reasons for and against Othello being responsible for his downfall through looking at critical interpretations of his character and actions.
The play, Othello is one of the most famous tragedies composed by William Shakespeare during the Renaissance period. It powerfully portrays a world where the acts of evil ultimately vanquishes fidelity, nobility and integrity. The central themes jealousy and manipulation embodies the foretold tragedies and the downfall tragedies of the characters due to one’s insecurities. Through the use of literary techniques and figurative language, Shakespeare has effectively explored the themes of jealousy and manipulation.
...illed his needs on aiding with Othello’s insecurities, and eventually was the cause of downfall in character, Othello.
The Phantom of the Opera centers on the Paris Opera House which has over time become the Phantom’s domain. Upon the news that the opera house has been bought and is under new ownership, the Phantom demands that the new owners honor the “agreement” he has established with the previous owners and that the fifth opera box is kept empty for his use and that his salary of 20,000 francs per month is honored. The Phantom also demands that Christine, whom he has secretly been giving singing lessons to, replace Carlotta Giudicelli, the opera company’s prima donna. He also warns that if his demands are not met, that the opera house and the opera company will need to pay the consequences. Though the origins of the Phantom are unknown to the general population of the opera house, Madame Giry knows more about the Phantom than she lets on. It is later discovered that Madame Giry helped the Phantom escape a life of abuse from a freak show and that she hid him at the opera house where she was studying ballet. It was during Christine’s and the Phantom’s singing lessons that he began to fall in love with her and came to be obsessed and protective of her. The return of Christine’s first love, Raoul, threatens to tear Christine an...
Twelfth Night or What You Will is one of Shakespeare’s most famous comedies. It has been performed hundreds of times and adapted into a number of modern films. The main plot of the play follows Viola, a girl who is rescued from a shipwreck and enters into the service of the Duke Orsino disguised as a man. Rising quickly in his estimation, Viola begins delivering messages of love on his behalf to Olivia, a noble woman who has no interest in Orsino’s advances. Over the course of the play Olivia falls in love with the disguised Viola, Viola falls in love with Orsino, and Viola’s twin brother Sebastian, who supposedly died in the shipwreck, returns. Following Sebastian’s return the twins are mistaken for each other, leading to both misunderstanding and marriage in the final scenes of the play. Alongside the main plot of Twelfth Night is an almost equally prominent subplot involving Malvolio, a servant of Olivia, who falls in love with her and who falls prey to a prank planned by the other members of the household who despise his abhorrence of fun. In the article “The Design of Twelfth Night” by L.G. Salingar, Salingar examines the plot and structure of the play and addresses the significance of the subplot. The purpose of this essay is to examine both evidence from the play and articles from other authors, with a focus on Salingar, who have written on the subject in order to determine the purpose of the subplot. In his article, Salingar comes to the conclusion that the purpose of the subplot is to provide a comic mirror of the main plot while amplifying the main themes of delusion, misrule and festivity. Salingar presents a solid argument, however he has neglected another lesser but significant element of the sub-plot which illustrate...
William Shakespeare's, Twelfth Night has many themes, but appearance vs. reality is the theme that illustrates a different picture from two perspectives, there are many characters behind their masks and disguises. Some are hiding love behind these disguises and some are trying to show their love through a different disguise. They both still being servants are using disguise differently. Malvolio, servant of Olivia, falls in love with the trap (the letter) thinking his lady likes him, and to show his love he uses a different appearance to express it. Viola, servant of Orsino, falls in love with him, but secretly, not wanting to express her love for him, because of her disguise as her barrier for that case. Viola/Ceasario is wearing a disguise and secretly loves Orsino. Malvolio, on the other hand, is also a servant but still changes his appearance to express love for the great lady Olivia. This essay will prove that disguises and appearances are symbolic of the characters named Viola and Malvolio and are differently used for both.