Bizet’s Carmen Uncovered by Richard Langham Smith, and: Carmen and the Staging of Spain: Recasting Bizet’s Opera in the Belle Epoque by Michael Christoforidis and Elizabeth Kertesz, and: Carmen Abroad: Bizet’s Opera on the Global Stage ed. by Richard Langham Smith and Clair Rowden

Abstract

Reviewed by: Bizet’s Carmen Uncovered by Richard Langham Smith, and: Carmen and the Staging of Spain: Recasting Bizet’s Opera in the Belle Epoque by Michael Christoforidis and Elizabeth Kertesz, and: Carmen Abroad: Bizet’s Opera on the Global Stage ed. by Richard Langham Smith and Clair Rowden Ralph P. Locke Bizet’s Carmen Uncovered. By Richard Langham Smith. Woodbridge, Surrey: Boydell, 2021. [xxvi, 340 p. ISBN 9781783275250 (hardcover), $39.95; ISBN 9781787449213 (e-book), price varies.] Illustrations, bibliography, index. Carmen and the Staging of Spain: Recasting Bizet’s Opera in the Belle Epoque. By Michael Christoforidis and Elizabeth Kertesz. (Currents in Latin American & Iberian Music.) London: Oxford University Press, 2018. [xxiii, 344 p. ISBN 9780195384567, $47.95 (hardcover); also available as e-book, ISBN and price vary.] Illustrations, bibliography, index. Carmen Abroad: Bizet’s Opera on the Global Stage. Edited by Richard Langham Smith and Clair Rowden. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. [xxii, 363 p. ISBN 9781108481618 (hardback), $99.99; also available as e-book, ISBN and price vary.] Illustrations, bibliographies, index. Great, widely performed operas are sacred monsters. Each has many varied, attention-getting, even startling or off-putting aspects, yet comes to us glowing with an acquired specialness. The result is that such works spark cartloads of words. Many operas have entire books written about them, for example, the “guidebooks” to individual major operas by such composers as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Giuseppe Verdi, Richard Wagner, Giacomo Puccini, Claude Debussy, Alban Berg, and Benjamin Britten. But some operas have had such a rich and complex history—and, like certain legendary monsters, have taken so many different shapes—that they invite more extended and detailed treatment. One of these, in fact the most obvious of these, is Georges Bizet’s Carmen, which has reached the opera houses of the world, and audio and video recordings, in two primary versions: the original, with lengthy spoken dialogues (characteristic of the opéra comique genre) and the version with recitatives composed by Ernest Guiraud after Bizet’s premature death. (The two very different versions of the work have made the task of preparing an authoritative critical edition exceedingly difficult.) Over the course of nearly a century and a half, the work has been altered, often drastically shortened, and endlessly reinterpreted. And it has permeated the cultural life of Europe, the Americas, and beyond: in ice-skating competitions, magazine ads, a filmed “hip-hopera” (starring pop diva Beyoncé and actor Mekhi Phifer), and much more. (Parlor game: name a half-dozen other operas that have proven to be anywhere near so culturally [End Page 383] fascinating, productive, quotable, excerptable, or misunderstood. I propose The Beggar’s Opera, Christoph Willibald Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice / Orphée et Eurydice, Don Giovanni, Charles Gounod’s Faust, the Ring Cycle, Boris Godunov, and Porgy and Bess.) The recent arrival of not one but three books about Carmen helps us sort out the wide-ranging impact of Carmen around the world—and also, just as importantly, the impact of the world on Carmen. Each book is researched and written at an admirably high level, and each has its own distinctive character— and specific stories that it tells, and tells well. Taken together, the three books demonstrate that Carmen is an even more obsession-inducing opera—and one with an even more complex and layered history—than many of its devoted admirers (of which I am one) have realized. Let me first note some basic similarities and differences among the three books. Then I’ll focus on the particular qualities of each and conclude with some recommendations for purchase (books and also scores). All three books are scholarly in nature yet accessible to laypersons, by which term I include not just opera- goers but also college and graduate students interested in the context of standard-repertory works that are all too often presented as existing in glorious isolation: as objects to be admired or adored. All three books will be read with pleasure by individuals interested in European cultural history, especially the stereotypes of Spain—and its inhabitants—that were widespread in France and (thanks in large part to Carmen) in lands far beyond. These books helpfully...