Table Of ContentRethinking Britten
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Rethinking Britten
EDITED BY
Philip Rupprecht
1
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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.
