My Dear Lady,
Although I cannot tell how you received my observations on the tragedy
of _The Distressed Mother_, and the comedy of _The Tender Husband_,
yet will I proceed to give your ladyship my opinion of the opera I was
at last night.
But what can I say, after mentioning what you so well know, the fine
scenes, the genteel and splendid company, the charming voices, and
delightful music?
If, Madam, one were all ear, and lost to every sense but that of
harmony, surely the Italian opera would be a transporting thing!--But
when one finds good sense, and instruction, and propriety, sacrificed
to the charms of sound, what an unedifying, what a mere temporary
delight does it afford! For what does one carry home, but the
remembrance of having been pleased so many hours by the mere vibration
of air, which, being but sound, you cannot bring away with you; and
must therefore enter the time passed in such a diversion, into the
account of those blank hours, from which one has not reaped so much as
one improving lesson?
Mr. B. observes, that when once sound is preferred to sense, we shall
depart from all our own worthiness, and, at best, be but the apes,
yea, the dupes, of those whom we may strive to imitate, but never can
reach, much less excel.
Mr. B. says, sometimes, that this taste is almost the only good fruit
our young nobility gather, and bring home from their foreign tours;
and that he found the English nation much ridiculed on this score, by
those very people who are benefited by their depravity. And if this
be the best, what must the other qualifications be, which they bring
home?--Yet every one does not return with so little improvement, it is
to be hoped.
But what can I say of an Italian opera?--For who can describe sound!
Or what words shall be found to embody air? And when we return, and
are asked our opinion of what we have seen or heard, we are only able
to answer, as I hinted above the scenery is fine, the company
splendid and genteel, the music charming for the time, the action
not extraordinary, the language unintelligible, and, for all these
reasons--the instruction none at all.
This is all the thing itself gives me room to say of the Italian
opera; very probably, for want of a polite taste, and a knowledge of
the language.
In my next, I believe, I shall give you, Madam, my opinion of a
diversion, which, I doubt, I shall like still less, and that is a
masquerade; for I fear I shall not be excused going to one, although
I have no manner of liking to it, especially in my present way. I am.
Madam, _your ladyship's most obliged and faithful_ P.B.
I must add another half sheet to this letter on the subject matter
of it, the opera; and am sure you will not be displeased with the
addition.
Mr. B. coming up just as I had concluded my letter, asked me what was
my subject? I told him I was giving your ladyship my notions of the
Italian opera. "Let me see what they are, my dear; for this is a
subject that very few of those who admire these performances, and
fewer still of those who decry them, know any thing of."
He read the above, and was pleased to commend it. "Operas," said he,
"are very sad things in England, to what they are in Italy; and the
translations given of them abominable: and indeed, our language will
not do them justice.
"Every nation, as you say, has its excellencies; and ours should not
quit the manly nervous sense, which is the distinction of the English
drama. One play of our celebrated Shakespeare will give infinitely
more pleasure to a sensible mind than a dozen English-Italian operas.
But, my dear, in Italy, they are quite another thing: and the sense is
not, as here, sacrificed so much to the sound, but that they are both
very compatible."
"Be pleased, Sir, to give me your observations on this head in
writing, and then I shall have something to send worthy of Lady
Davers's acceptance."
"I will, my dear;" and he took a pen, and wrote the inclosed; which
I beg your ladyship to return me; because I will keep it for my
instruction, if I should be led to talk of this subject in company.
"Let my sister know," said he, "that I have given myself no time to
re-peruse what I have written. She will do well, therefore, to correct
it, and return it to you."
"In Italy, judges of operas are so far from thinking the drama or
poetical part of their operas nonsense, as the unskilled in Italian
rashly conclude in England, that if the Libretto, as they call it, is
not approved, the opera, notwithstanding the excellence of the music,
will be condemned. For the Italians justly determine, that the very
music of an opera cannot be complete and pleasing, if the drama be
incongruous, as I may call it, in its composition, because, in order
to please, it must have the necessary contrast of the grave and the
light, that is, the diverting equally blended through the whole. If
there be too much of the first, let the music be composed ever so
masterly in that style, it will become heavy and tiresome; if the
latter prevail, it will surfeit with its levity: wherefore it is the
poet's business to adapt the words for this agreeable mixture: for the
music is but secondary, and subservient to the words; and if there be
an artful contrast in the drama, there will be the same in the music,
supposing the composer to be a skilful master.
"Now, since in England, the practice has been to mutilate, curtail,
and patch up a drama in Italian, in order to introduce favourite airs,
selected from different authors, the contrast has always been broken
thereby, without every one's knowing the reason: and since ignorant
mercenary prompters, though Italians, have been employed in
hotch-potch, and in translating our dramas from Italian into English,
how could such operas appear any other than incongruous nonsense?"
Permit me, dear Madam, to repeat my assurances, that I am, and must
ever be, _your obliged sister and servant_,