Opera North Peter Grimes

[JimD]

I'm extremely bothered by it, too...

I'm not quite clear what the big problem is here, as it impinges on the underlying theme of the disintegration of the hitherto disciplined Aschenbach under sexual tension.

As to the general question of gender shifts in characters (the fairies in Shakespeare's Dream were mentioned earlier) I cannot imagine he at least would have been much concerned by it. I may however be desensitized by just having seen the RSC's As You Like It, where Rosalind in Shakespeare's time would have been a boy playing a girl playing a boy inviting another boy to make (verbal) love to 'him' as if 'he' were a girl. Work the sexual tensions of that one out!

[Mary Chambers]

I'm not quite clear what the big problem is here, as it impinges on the underlying theme of the disintegration of the hitherto disciplined Aschenbach under sexual tension.

I had been thinking about this point of view even before I read your post. It's true that the gender is perhaps not very important in the light of 'passion as confusion and the stripping of dignity', and I think Mann himself said he was partly thinking of Goethe's obsession with a young girl. However, in Mann's time, and Britten's, and even perhaps our own, wouldn't an infatuation with someone of the same sex cause more confusion and stripping of dignity?

More important in this case is Britten's intention. We can't ignore the autobiographical content of this opera. He must have had, in the back or even front of his mind, the memory of his own infatuation with David Hemmings at the time of the premiere of the Turn of the Screw, in Venice. There is also an aspect of this autobiographical content that is often ignored - that Tadzio is an aspect of Britten himself as much as Aschenbach is. Peter Pears mentioned this. The golden child, the beach (Lowestoft or Venice, who cares?), the 'victor of all' in the Games of Apollo - Britten was Victor Ludorum at his prep school. He never quite recovered from the loss of the glory and innocence of his own childhood. This, and his own ageing, are all written into this opera.

I can see that the Tadzio figure's gender could be regarded as ambiguous or even unimportant, but for Britten, I doubt if it was - and surely this matters? I think he would have greatly disliked the idea of Tadzio being played by girl-as-boy.

I'm afraid this is all rather far from the topic of Opera North's Peter Grimes! Apologies.

[amateur51]

I had been thinking about this point of view even before I read your post. It's true that the gender is perhaps not very important in the light of 'passion as confusion and the stripping of dignity', and I think Mann himself said he was partly thinking of Goethe's obsession with a young girl. However, in Mann's time, and Britten's, and even perhaps our own, wouldn't an infatuation with someone of the same sex cause more confusion and stripping of dignity?

More important in this case is Britten's intention. We can't ignore the autobiographical content of this opera. He must have had, in the back or even front of his mind, the memory of his own infatuation with David Hemmings at the time of the premiere of the Turn of the Screw, in Venice. There is also an aspect of this autobiographical content that is often ignored - that Tadzio is an aspect of Britten himself as much as Aschenbach is. Peter Pears mentioned this. The golden child, the beach (Lowestoft or Venice, who cares?), the 'victor of all' in the Games of Apollo - Britten was Victor Ludorum at his prep school. He never quite recovered from the loss of the glory and innocence of his own childhood. This, and his own ageing, are all written into this opera.

I can see that the Tadzio figure's gender could be regarded as ambiguous or even unimportant, but for Britten, I doubt if it was - and surely this matters? I think he would have greatly disliked the idea of Tadzio being played by girl-as-boy.

I'm afraid this is all rather far from the topic of Opera North's Peter Grimes! Apologies.

Fascinating Mary, many thanks

[JimD]

Fascinating Mary, many thanks

Indeed. For some reason I had assumed that it wasn't 'girl-as-boy', for some practical reason opaque to me, but a perhaps misguided attempt to explore the altered sexual and social dynamics, if any, of Tadzio being a girl. I hadn't thought in terms of the personal importance of the specific gender relations to Britten. It begins to take us back to the old argument about the importance of, and the legitimacy of claims to knowledge about, the artist's intentions, and thus the boundaries of legitimate re-interpretation. I tend to be relatively conservative about this, but suggest that in this case the underlying themes within the artwork itself(!) are little altered.

[Mary Chambers]

It begins to take us back to the old argument about the importance of, and the legitimacy of claims to knowledge about, the artist's intentions, and thus the boundaries of legitimate re-interpretation.

Of course none of us can know what Britten's (or anyone else's) exact intentions or thoughts were. "Who really understands the workings of the creative mind?" as his Aschenbach asks - but I don't think the significance of the aspects of his life that I mentioned should be overlooked or lightly dismissed, all the same. They were there, whether or not he consciously included them in the opera.