# Novels about operas?



## russetvelvet (Oct 14, 2016)

I stumbled upon a Sci-fi the other day whose main characters are opera singers and 50% of the plot revolves around the line of work they do. The author is very knowledgeable about the art, the business and is at least an aficionado. Here's the link, not bad at all for a casual read for fun:
http://storiesonline.net/s/11013/castaway?ind=1

So, what are some other novels that have a lot to do with the thing we love? Truly great novelists sometimes use opera as a plot device: Dumas père mentioned Guillaume Tell and confused which act which aria belongs to. Leo Tolstoy wrote about opera in both W&P and Anna Karenina but never indicated the names. Madame Bovary went to Lucia...any other works that feature opera more than just a sketch?


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Gaston Leroux's _Fantôme de l'Opéra (Phantom of the Opera)_!

Terry Pratchett's _Maskerade_, one of his Discworld novels featuring Granny Weatherwax. Parodies both opera and _The Phantom of the Opera_.

Several detective stories:

Edmund Crispin's _Swan Song_ (1947) involves a production of Wagner's _Meistersinger_. Amusing and cleverly written, like all of Crispin's novels.

H.R.F. Keating's _Death of a Fat God_ (1963) is set at an opera house; the title refers to an imaginary 20th century opera. Thinly plotted but amusing. The opening chapter cleverly tweaks _Tosca_.

Gladys Mitchell's _Death at the Opera_ (1934), despite the title, isn't set at an opera at all; it's set at a school production of _The Mikado_. The motive is (deliberately) far fetched, but related to the performance. Mitchell's books are eccentric but bracing and intelligent (rather like Sayers), and her psychiatrist detective Mrs. Bradley is great fun.

Agatha Christie studied to be an opera singer; none of her novels are set at the opera, but Wagner and Puccini are vital to _Passenger to Frankfurt_ (1970) and the short story "Swan Song" (in _The Listerdale Mystery_, 1934). Under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, she wrote _Giant's Bread_ (1930), about a Modernist composer. (Charles Osborne, who wrote one of the best studies of Verdi, was a Christie fan; his _Life and Crimes_ is a good overview.)

I know there's at least one novel that's based on an opera (rather than the other way round).

EDIT: Oh, and Oscar Wilde's _Portrait of Dorian Gray_, of course.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

John Dickson Carr's Bride of Newgate (1950), set in 1815,, has a scene at the Covent Garden riots.

George MacDonald Fraser's Royal Flash has another riot at an English opera house, later in the century. The star is Lola Montez, mistress of Liszt, Dumas and Ludwig I.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Ever thought of writing your own opera Simon?


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Mardrew Czgowchwz (pronounced Mardu Gorgeous) is a wonderfully witty and fun novel about a Callas-like soprano.
https://smile.amazon.com/Mawrdew-Cz...sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=mardew+czgowchwz+(Book)


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

SimonTemplar said:


> . . .
> Edmund Crispin's _Swan Song_ (1947) involves a production of Wagner's _Meistersinger_. Amusing and cleverly written, like all of Crispin's novels.
> . . .


Years ago a friend and I adapted "Swan Song" for the stage. For practical purposes we had to switch the opera to something more intimate, so we used "Barber."

The production got mixed reviews, but the best one we received was from Marilyn Stasio, then a theatre critic, but also the detective fiction critic for the New York Times. She, of course, knew Crispin's work, and thus, what we were trying to achieve.

By the way, Crispin (real name Bruce Montgomery) was also a composer.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

"Bel Canto", a murder mystery by Anne Patchett was loosely based on Renee Fleming.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton opens "On a January evening of the early seventies, Christine Nilsson was singing in Faust at the Academy of Music in New York." The entire first chapter takes place at the opera house. (The 1993 film used the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, as the one in NY was gone).

There is a Wikipedia page that lists fiction that features opera (though it certainly isn't complete!)

Perhaps my favorite bit from the list is that Helen Traubel wrote a _The Metropolitan Opera Murders_, in which the prompter - a famous former heldentenor - dies suddenly during a performance of _Die Walküre_. The soprano (guess who she is based on!) helps the detective solve the case.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

mountmccabe said:


> The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton opens "On a January evening of the early seventies, Christine Nilsson was singing in Faust at the Academy of Music in New York." The entire first chapter takes place at the opera house. (The 1993 film used the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, as the one in NY was gone).
> 
> There is a Wikipedia page that lists fiction that features opera (though it certainly isn't complete!)
> 
> Perhaps my favorite bit from the list is that Helen Traubel wrote a _The Metropolitan Opera Murders_, in which the prompter - a famous former heldentenor - dies suddenly during a performance of _Die Walküre_. The soprano (guess who she is based on!) helps the detective solve the case.


Reading Wharton's "The Age of Mirth" at the moment. That also has a scene at the opera. (Maybe more than one _ I haven't finished it yet.)


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Pugg said:


> Ever thought of writing your own opera Simon?


I've already written it. It's a tribute piece to Rossini, Wagner and French grand opera. Rossini wrote an aria on a single note (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffZiEgC4Tu0); so is my entire opera. It's scored for kazoo, doodlesack, sackbut, penny whistle, and catgut violin (with the cat still attached and very much alive). It lasts for 23 days, at the end of which the audience is shot, the theatre blown up, and a volcano explodes. Not just erupts, but explodes; I drop an atom bomb into the crater. Unfortunately, I'm having trouble finding backers.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

SimonTemplar said:


> I've already written it. It's a tribute piece to Rossini, Wagner and French grand opera. Rossini wrote an aria on a single note (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffZiEgC4Tu0); so is my entire opera. It's scored for kazoo, doodlesack, sackbut, penny whistle, and catgut violin (with the cat still attached and very much alive). It lasts for 23 days, at the end of which the audience is shot, the theatre blown up, and a volcano explodes. Not just erupts, but explodes; I drop an atom bomb into the crater. Unfortunately, I'm having trouble finding backers.


Ask all the( opera) critics for sponsoring, talking about good riddance.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Many years ago I read an SF novel by a classic author (ie, one you would have heard of) that involved an opera company and time travel, whose title and author (and most of the plot) escapes me. At first I thought that was what you were referencing until I followed your link. Now that you've brought up the subject, I'll try to remember. Speaking of SF, Fred Hoyle's "October the First is Too Late" features a classical composer as its principal protagonist.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

In Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf, the protagonist meets the ghost of Mozart. During this supernatural encounter, music from Don Giovanni is playing in the background.

Also, Milan Kundera's novel The Book of Laughter and Forgetting has a character called Tamina, which I assume is a reference to the character Tamino in Mozart's The Magic Flute. However, the plot of Kundera's novel seems to have very little to do with the plot of Mozart's opera, except maybe in a very indirect and metaphorical way.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Shaw and Hoffmann both wrote short stories about _Don Giovanni_.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Okay, "Narabedla LTD" by Frederic Pohl is about singers, actors, dancers, etc. who are offered the chance to have career ending injuries reversed in exchange for agreeing to perform on a circuit of alien worlds many light years distant. The protagonist is a former opera singer.


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## Amara (Jan 12, 2012)

Not a novel, but I recently read a play called "Golden Age" by Terrence McNally, about the opening night of _I Puritani_. Characters include Bellini, Rossini, Maria Malibran, Giovanni Rubini, etc.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Amara said:


> Not a novel, but I recently read a play called "Golden Age" by Terrence McNally, about the opening night of _I Puritani_. Characters include Bellini, Rossini, Maria Malibran, Giovanni Rubini, etc.


McNally is an opera fan. Among other works of his that come to mind are "Master Class" about a fictional class taught by Maria Callas, "The Lisbon Traviata" about some opera lovers and "The Stendahl Syndrome" two one act plays with one consisting of the thoughts of a conductor while leading an orchestra in Wagner.

He's also written several opera librettos and the books for a number of musicals.


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## schigolch (Jun 26, 2011)

One pretty interesting piece is Franz Werfel's "Verdi. Roman der Oper". Werfel, that was pretty close to the world of opera himself, plays with the idea of Verdi and Wagner being both at Venice in 1883, during the Carnival season. 

I think there is an English translation.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Margaret Truman's "Murder at the Opera" is a fun read for mystery lovers. Truman, daughter of President Harry Truman, was a singer, and her knowledge shows in her use of Puccini's _Tosca_ in the plot.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Balzac's _Sarrasine_, a novella from his _Comedie humaine_, tells the tale of a hapless man who falls in love with a castrato believing him to be a woman and ends up dead from the complications. Not centrally about opera, however.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

EdwardBast said:


> Balzac's _Sarrasine_, a novella from his _Comedie humaine_, tells the tale of a hapless man who falls in love with a castrato believing him to be a woman and ends up dead from the complications.


Very cagey of you, not detailing those complications.

(Oh, c'mon!)


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## ma7730 (Jun 8, 2015)

Thomas Mann was very influenced by Wagner, and even wrote a novel entitled _Tristan_. In _The Magic Mountain_ the characters trapped in an Alpine sanatorium discuss _Tristan und Isolde_, _Aida_, _Winterreise_ and _Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun_.
You can see what he thinks about Wagner's Parsifal here: http://www.monsalvat.no/mann.htm


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

ma7730 said:


> Thomas Mann was very influenced by Wagner, and even wrote a novel entitled _Tristan_. In _The Magic Mountain_ the characters trapped in an Alpine sanatorium discuss _Tristan und Isolde_, _Aida_, _Winterreise_ and _Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun_.
> You can see what he thinks about Wagner's Parsifal here: http://www.monsalvat.no/mann.htm


He also wrote "Doctor Faustus" about a composer whose musical ideas are somewhat akin to those of Schoenberg. (Although I read the book years ago, I am not competent to get into either a literary or musical debate.) I looked it up in Wikipedia, and apparently the protagonist Adrian Leverkühn did compose opera.


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## amfortas (Jun 15, 2011)

_Tosca's Quest_, a sequel to Puccini's opera, recounts the famous singer's further adventures in the great cities of Europe, after surviving her fall from the Castel Sant'Angelo.

Unfortunately, I never got it published.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Very cagey of you, not detailing those complications.
> 
> (Oh, c'mon!)


Okay, SPOILER ALERT for all of the Balzac fans making their way through his work:

The unfortunately besmitten discovers (ahem ) his error. Shocked, outraged and finally understanding why all of his acquaintances have been snickering at him for weeks, he attempts to smite the former love of his life but is accosted by the authorities who in turn smite him dead.


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## Scopitone (Nov 22, 2015)

Anne Rice's _Cry to Heaven_ is about the world of Castrati. It's been awhile since I read it, but I remember enjoying the story. I might have to revisit.

It's Anne Rice, so it has plenty of sex. But no supernatural elements IIRC.


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## SoleilCouchant (May 4, 2017)

SimonTemplar said:


> Gaston Leroux's _Fantôme de l'Opéra (Phantom of the Opera)_!


I was gonna say, someone better say it!  That book is what got me into opera in the first place, not sure if I should be embarrassed to admit that or not.

And, speaking of which...



mountmccabe said:


> The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton opens "On a January evening of the early seventies, Christine Nilsson was singing in Faust at the Academy of Music in New York." The entire first chapter takes place at the opera house. (The 1993 film used the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, as the one in NY was gone).


Funny little piece of trivia, it's almost certain that the character of Christine in Leroux's Le Fantôme de l'Opéra is based off of Christine Nilsson (born Kristina Nilsson). Leroux never actually outright said that (that I'm aware of) but everything points to that. Even reviews in his book seem to be lifted from actual reviews of Nilsson in certain roles, like the Queen of the Night, with a few words changed here and there. And their histories are almost identical, like being discovered at a fair in Ljungby by a "Professor Valerius" etc. So yeah, full circle.


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