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ROBERT DONINGTON, Opera and Its Symbols: The Unity of Words, Music and Staging. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990. viii. 2-48 pp. ISBN 0-300-04713-4 Robert Donington meant this book to be the culmination of his extensive work in the field of open. In many ways it completes the proces began many years before in Wagner's "Ring " and Its Symbols (London, 1983 ) and The Rise of Opera (New York, 1981). Indeed, the author regards it as a re-considenition of his work in this field and hopes that it will be "in this new presentation, at once contracted and expanded" [Donnington 1440: 4] that his contribution will be assessed. Although it would thus seem to he addressed to a scholarly audience, the work is in fact quite readily accessible to the general public -or at least that segment of it which is interested in opera. One example of expansion is the author's definition of opera itself. In The Rise of Opera. opera was defined its "staged drama unfolding integrally in words and music." [Donington 1981:201 whereas in Opera and its Symbols, this has been enlarged to include the "unity of words, music and staging." Indeed, the mural point of the book is that opera must he presented as a unified whole with its original music, text and staging if listeners are to receive the complete message of the work of an. Only in this way will the symbolism presented in each of the three arts act in complementary fashion. The "enemy" here is the stage director who insists on modernizing the production (something he would do to the music only in peril of his life!) "on the misguided assumption that he can give a new freshness to the old conventions|.]... a mistaken enterprise from the study [Donington 1990: 12]. Donington objects to the grafting of alien imagery with a totally different message onto a story already complete in itself: Rigoletto as a Mafia tale, the Ring as a Marxist morality play. And indeed, on the proverbial "desert island." given only one possible production of an opera, who would not opt for the original? But we are not as yet - on a desert island, and many of the operas which Donington discusses later in this book are performed often, perhaps too often, to maintain the interest of the knowledgeable opera fan. In this case, I, for one, do not object to some new ideas in staging, second-best as they may he. as a way to freshe the sense of the work. to surprise. to interpret better an image for the modern audience, or to draw a comparison between a character or situation which may illuminate both the opera itself and also a contemporary social situation. What works for one viewer may not, of course, work for another, this being a highly individual mailer. Perhaps, when an an work leaps continents, for example. it will mean more to a greater proportion of the audience if some (if the staging is reinterpreted tor that new setting. Perhaps, again, that new staging would he inappropriate if transplanted back 10 the original scene. I do not think the matter is so simply decided by the caveat, "back in the original." To be fair, though, I find my self often agreeing with Donington's judgement of the productions which he describes, although the reader may sometimes find the superior tone in which these opinions are couched somewhat patronizing. Some modernizations Donington will allow if he feels they do no violence to the original. In other words, he does not reject a change in staging on principle (although we are often made to believe that he does) but only if it is infelicitous. The second major theme of this book is the application of Jungian archetypes to the slories of many well-known operas. Here, too, there is a connection with the author's previous work. Wagner's "Ring: " and Its Symbols presented just such an analysis of that monumental nineteenth-century work: in at least one review of the 1963 book, the criticd (not overly sympathetic 10 what he called "pseudo-scientific waffle") admitted that this son of analysis might be possible for Wagner, whose characters are "puppets" anyway, but averred that it would be impossible to apply to the operas of Mozart or Verdi whose characters were real human beings. …

canadian university music review

Robert Donington. Opera and Its Symbols: The Unity of Words, Music and Staging. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990. viii, 248 pp. ISBN 0-300-04713-4