"There is a word in the Gipsy language to which those who speak it
attach ideas of peculiar reverence, far superior to that connected
with the name of the Supreme Being, the creator of themselves and
the universe. This word is _Lácha_, which with them is the corporeal
chastity of the females; we say corporeal chastity, for no other
do they hold in the slightest esteem; it is lawful amongst them,
nay praise-worthy, to be obscene in look, gesture, and discourse,
to be accessories to vice, and to stand by and laugh at the worst
abominations of the Busné (Busno is the term used by the Spanish
gipsies for the Spaniard or indeed any person not a gipsy), provided
their _Lácha ye trupos_, or corporeal chastity remains unblemished. The
Gipsy child, from her earliest years, is told by her strange mother,
that a good Calli need only dread one thing in this world, and that is
the loss of _Lácha_, in comparison with which that of life is of little
consequence, as in such an event she will be provided for, but what
provision is there for a gipsy who has lost her _Lácha_? 'Bear this in
mind, my child,' she will say, 'and now eat this bread, and go forth
and see what you can steal.'
"A Gipsy girl is generally betrothed at the age of fourteen to the
youth whom her parents deem a suitable match, and who is generally
a few years older than herself. Marriage is invariably preceded by
betrothment.... With the Busné or Gentiles, the betrothed female is
allowed the freest intercourse, going whither she will, and returning
at all times and seasons. With respect to the Busné, indeed, the
parents are invariably less cautious than with their own race, as they
conceive it next to an impossibility that their child should lose her
_Lácha_ by any intercourse with _the white blood_; and true it is that
experience has proved that their confidence in this respect is not
altogether idle. The Gitanas have in general a decided aversion to the
white men; some few instances, however, to the contrary are said to
have occurred."
The gitanas, Borrow goes on to explain, are never above exciting
passion in the Busné which, however, they refuse to satisfy. Their
dances for the most part are lascivious and obscene. They often act
as procuresses. But let no Busno presume from these facts that he may
count on a more intimate acquaintanceship. Richard Ford in "Gatherings
from Spain" in his description of the _romalis_ supports Borrow in his
theory: "However indecent these dances may be, yet the performers are
inviolably chaste, and as far at least as ungipsy guests are concerned,
may be compared to iced punch at a rout; young girls go through them
before the applauding eyes of their parents and brothers, who resent to
the death any attempt on their sisters' virtue."
Mérimée refers to the matter in a letter to the _Inconnue_: "What he
(Borrow) relates of the gipsies is perfectly true, and his personal
observations are entirely in accord with mine save on a single point.
In his capacity of clergyman (_sic_), he may very well have deceived
himself where I, in my capacity of Frenchman and layman, was able to
make conclusive experiments." In spite of the weight of Mérimée's
personal experience it may be noted that the majority of Spanish
writers are in accord with Borrow, who was _not_ a clergyman. And, as
Professor Northup slyly points out, the man who taught Isopel Berners
of Mumpers Dingle to conjugate the verb "to love" in Armenian may not
have been so naïve an observer after all.
Whether gipsies are corporeally chaste or not[1] is, however, a matter
of the slightest moment in relation to the masterpiece that Mérimée
based on the theory that they are not. As Havelock Ellis so precisely
puts it: "Art is in its sphere as supreme over fact as Science in its
sphere is supreme over fiction. The artist may play either fast or
loose with Science, and the finest artist will sometimes play loose."
It may be remarked that in general Borrow was more inclined to play
loose than Mérimée.
It is interesting enough to realize that "The Bible in Spain," in
itself a masterpiece, was the inspiration for another masterpiece,
one of the great short stories of all literature. Curiously enough
still a third masterpiece emerged from the activities of the British
Bible Society, _Carmen_, the opera. In transferring the story to the
stage Messrs. Meilhac and Halévy, in searching for dramatic emphasis,
have thrown overboard a good deal of the wild and wanton atmosphere,
the calid passion, the brutal austerity of the original tale. Carmen,
in their version, becomes a mixture of Spanish gipsy and Parisian
cocotte. In certain scenes, such as that of the Seguidilla and the duet
in the last act a good deal of Mérimée's feeling has been preserved
but the scene of the quintet in which the other gipsies taunt Carmen
with being _amoureuse_ is probably essentially Parisian. So, too,
perhaps, is the scene of the Habanera. Spaniards have long protested
against the work because, as nearly as I can discover, they consider
it an _idealization_. Spanish women as a rule make the worst Carmens,
although they have often achieved notable successes in another Spanish
character, Rosina in _The Barber of Seville_.[2] An understanding of
the French opéra-comique form is essential to a fine interpretation of
this gipsy heroine; even a good deal of the music is not essentially
Spanish. If it were it would probably not be great because Bizet was
a Frenchman and must perforce in writing French opera hear Spain with
French ears.... Nevertheless I see no reason why a singer should not
go to Mérimée for many hints; indeed I think she might even go farther
and study Borrow's conception of the Spanish gipsy character. One line
alone in Mérimée would suggest a new interpretation to an actress
capable of realizing it. José is speaking: "Monsieur, quand cette
fille-là riait, il n'y avait pas moyen de parler raison. Tout le monde
riait avec elle." But an actress must conceive any part in terms of her
own personality and this effect could be made only by a very complete
_charmeuse_.
In the original story the bull-fighter, Lucas, scarcely appears and
he is a picador not an _espada_ as he becomes in the opera under the
new name of Escamillo. Why was this name changed? I have a theory,
unsupported by any evidence, that Bizet asked his librettists to
furnish him with a name which would fit the music of the marvellous
duet in the last act. He probably had achieved the phrase which now
accompanies _Ah! je t'aime, Escamillo_, only to discover that it
could not be married to the name Lucas. Jealousy remains the motive
for the murder of Carmen although the scenes are quite differently
arranged in the tale and in the lyric drama.... Micaela is new. The
only suggestion of her in Mérimée's story is the following line of
José's: "J'étais jeune alors; je pensais toujours au pays, et je
croyais pas qu'il y eût de jolies filles sans jupes bleues et sans
nattes tombant sur les épaules." Carmen's second meeting with José does
not take place at Lillas Pastia's but the third does, and ever so many
details such as the "chaine avec du fil de laiton," the cassia which
the hussy removes from her lips to toss at José's feet, the rejected
ring, etc., are incidents from Mérimée. Why, one wonders, does not
some interpreter remember that the original Carmen broke a plate and
from the pieces fashioned castanets to play while she danced the
_romalis_ for José?... The brutal García le Borgne, Carmen's _rom_,
disappears completely. He is not essential to the intrigue devised by
the librettists. They have also blotted out Carmen's very diverting
adventures with the Englishman at Gibraltar.
_Carmen_ was produced at the Paris Opéra-Comique March 3, 1875.
The first performance was coldly received. Charles Pigot (Bizet's
biographer) informs us that the prelude to the second act was repeated;
the air of the Toreador and the quintet were applauded: that was
all. The curtain fell on each act to complete indifference. The
discouragement of the composer seems to have been deep. We do not
wonder at it. Vincent d'Indy told Edmond Galabert that after the first
act he and a group of young musicians met Bizet on the sidewalk near
the stage entrance of the theatre and felicitated him on the life
and colour in the music. Bizet responded: "Vous êtes les premiers
qui me disiez ça, et je crains bien que vous ne soyez les derniers."
_Carmen_ was a failure. The reviews were bad. There were, curiously
enough, many charges of immorality. Pigot assures us that Camille du
Locle, the director of the theatre, who never believed in _Carmen_,
was more or less responsible for these. To a minister who wrote in
asking for a loge for the first night he replied that it would perhaps
be better if he came to the general rehearsal to see if he found the
piece sufficiently respectable for his wife and daughters!... Possibly
these charges of immorality awakened curiosity. At any rate it is
certain that after the fifth performance the receipts rose and the
apathy of the audiences became less marked. The piece was given for the
thirty-seventh time on June 13, just before the theatre closed for the
summer. Bizet had died June 3. In the fall _Carmen_ was revived and
given thirteen representations; then not again in Paris until 1883.
At various times attempts have been made to prove that _Carmen_ did
not fail when it was first produced. The most notable of these is
an article contributed to the "Ménestrel" (1903; p. 53) by Arthur
Pougin entitled "La Légende de la Chute de _Carmen_ et la Mort de
Bizet" in which he quotes Mme. Galli-Marié: "L'insuccès de _Carmen_
à la création, mais c'est une légende! _Carmen_ n'est pas tombée au
bout de quelques représentations, comme beaucoup le croient.... Nous
l'avons jouée plus de quarante fois dans la saison, et quand ce pauvre
Bizet est mort, le succes de son chef d'œuvre semblait definitivement
assis."... Pigot scoffs at this, pointing out that the exigencies of
the répertoire often make it necessary for a director to perform a work
oftener than it will pay to do so. His evidence is cumulative and for
the most part convincing.
According to H. Sutherland Edwards, who seems to have acquired this
information from Marie Roze, in its original form the opera included
two complete airs for Carmen which, in the end, the composer and his
librettists decided to suppress. The gipsy was to have been represented
as capable of remorse (!) and after the scene in which she foretells
her death by the cards was to be left alone to give vent to her
feelings in a pathetic air! The other omitted air occurred in the last
act.
Mr. Edwards gives us more details: The bull-fight, according to the
original design of the authors, was to be shown in the form of a
tableau, occupying all the back of the stage with live chorus figures
and "supers" in the front of the picture and painted figures behind
them. Escamillo was to have been seen triumphing over the figure of
the fallen bull, while the crowd of spectators overlooking the arena
shouted vociferously the air of the Toreador. In a dark background (the
back of the stage alone being illuminated) the figures of Carmen and
Don José were to be seen.
Charles Pigot tells us that Micaela's song was composed originally for
_Griselidis_ (an opera for which Sardou supplied the book and which
Bizet never completed). The score of _Carmen_ would be perfect without
it. The story of the Habanera is related elsewhere in this volume (p.
27), and need not be repeated here.
_Carmen_ originally contained a good deal of spoken dialogue, which is
still to be heard at the Paris Opéra-Comique. Guiraud (not Godard, as
Clara Louise Kellogg has it) wrote the music for the recitatives and it
is with these that the work is usually performed in foreign theatres,
including the Metropolitan Opera House. In some theatres, however, a
bastard version, a combination of these two forms, is given.
It is probable that Spaniards base their main objection to _Carmen_
on the idealization of a national type offered by the libretto. It is
not likely that they object to the music. At any rate they have always
found Italian, French, and German music pleasant to their ears and
many Spanish composers have been less Spanish than Bizet, who after
all, was a Jew, and something of an oriental himself! The dances and
some of the entr'acte music, then, of this opera may be considered
thoroughly Spanish. But Spanish or not there is no denying that Bizet
succeeded in writing one of the most delightful of operas. When I first
read Nietzsche's "The Case of Wagner" I was inclined to feel that the
German in his rage against Wagner had put up the silliest of opponents
against him in order to make his ex-hero more ridiculous. I do not feel
that way today. I humbly subscribe to all of Nietzsche's outpourings:
"This music seems to me to be perfect. It approaches lightly, nimbly,
and with courtesy. It is amiable, it does not produce _sweat_. 'What
is good is easy; everything divine runs with light feet'--the first
proposition of my Æsthetics. This music is wicked, subtle, and
fatalistic; it remains popular at the same time,--it has the subtlety
of a race, not of an individual. It is rich. It is precise.... It
has borrowed from Mérimée the logic in passion, the shortest route,
_stern_ necessity. It possesses, above all, what belongs to the warm
climate, the dryness of the air, its _limpidezza_.... This music is
gay; but it has not a French or a German gaiety. Its gaiety is African;
destiny hangs over it, its happiness is short, sudden, and without
forgiveness." Has any one ever described _Carmen_ so well? And there
is much more. I pray you, turn to "The Case of Wagner" and read it all
... and perhaps begin to believe, as I do, that aside from _Tristan_
Wagner himself never penned so complete a masterpiece.
Before we begin to glance at some of the ladies who have attempted to
do justice to the Spanish gipsy it might be well to pause for a few
seconds on two descriptions of the _cigarrera_ type. Gautier visited
the celebrated Fábrica de Tobacos in Seville, where Carmen was employed
until she began to stick knives into her co-workers. Here is what he
says of it:
"L'on nous conduisit aux ateliers où se roulent les cigares en
feuilles. Cinq où six cents femmes sont employées à cette préparation.
Quand nous mîmes le pied dans leur salle, nous fûmes assailis par un
ouragan de bruits: elles parlaient, chantaient et se disputaient toutes
à la fois. Je n'ai jamais entendu un vacarme pareil. Elles étaient
jeunes pour la plupart, et il y en avait de fort jolies. Le négligé
extrême de leur toilette permettait d'apprécier leurs charmes en toute
liberté. Quelques-unes portaient résolûment à l'angle de leur bouche
un bout de cigare avec l'aplomb d'un officier de hussards; d'autres,
ô muse, viens à mon aide! d'autres ... chiquaient comme de vieux
matelots, car on leur laisse prendre autant de tabac qu'elles en
peuvent consommer sur place.... La _cigarrera_ de Séville est un type,
comme la _manola_ de Madrid."
I also append Edmondo de Amicis's description: "The women are almost
all in three immense rooms, divided into three parts, by three rows of
pilasters. The first effect is stupendous. Eight hundred girls present
themselves at once to your view. They are divided into groups of five
or six, and are seated around work-tables, crowded together, those
in the distance indistinct, and the last scarcely visible. They are
all young, but few are children; in all, eight hundred dark heads of
hair, and eight hundred dusky faces from every province of Andalusia,
from Jaen to Cadiz, and from Granada to Seville. You hear the buzzing
that you would in a square full of people. The walls, from one end
of the three rooms to the other, are covered with skirts, shawls,
handkerchiefs, and scarfs, and, curiously enough, the whole mass of
rags, which would be sufficient to fill a hundred second-hand shops,
presents two predominating colours, both continuous, one above the
other, like the stripes of a flag. The black of the shawls is above,
the red of the dresses below, and mixed with the latter, are white,
purple, and yellow, so that you seem to see an immense fancy costume
shop, or a large dancing-room, in which the ballet girls, in order
to obtain more freedom of movement, have hung everything on the wall
which is not absolutely necessary to cover them decently. The girls
put on these dresses when they leave, but wear old things while at
work, which, however, are white and red like the others. The heat being
insupportable, they lighten their clothing as much as possible, so
that among those five thousand there may be hardly fifty whose arms
or shoulders the visitor will not have the opportunity of admiring
at his leisure, without counting the exceptional cases which present
themselves quite unexpectedly in passing from one room to the other,
behind the doors, columns, or in distant corners. There are some very
beautiful faces, and even those that are not absolutely beautiful, have
something about them which attracts the eye and remains impressed upon
the memory--the colouring, eyes, brows, and smile, for instance. Many,
and especially the so-called _gitane_, are dark brown, like mulattoes,
and have protruding lips; others have such large eyes that a faithful
likeness of them would seem an exaggeration. The majority are small,
well made, and all wear a rose, pink, or a bunch of field flowers
among their braids."[3]
Mlle. Célestine Galli-Marié was the first Carmen. She is said to have
been delightful, but the first interpreter of a part always has an
advantage over those who follow her; she need not fear comparison.
She was charged with immorality but it is not likely that she allowed
herself as many gipsy liberties as some of her successors. Charles
Pigot tells us that she took advantage of Mérimée's vigorous etching:
"elle avait pris modèle sur ce portrait d'une ressemblance qui donne
le frisson de la vie au personnage évoqué. Oeillades assassines,
regards chargés de volupté qui livrent la victime pieds et poings liés,
déhanchements lascifs, poings sur la hanche, rien ne manquait à la
ressemblance; et ce déploiement de perversités physiques, refletant
à merveille l'âme de cette bohémienne ehontée, cette crudité de tons
dans le rendu du geste et de l'allure qui choquèrent bien des personnes
et firent crier a l'immoralité, étaient indiqués par l'effronterie
du personnage, et, j'ajouterai, nécessaires à la verité du drame, à
l'explication de l'ensorcellement subit du navarrais."
Arthur Pougin says of her: "Mme. Galli-Marié should take rank with
those numerous artists who, although endowed with no great voice, have
for a century past rendered to this theatre services made remarkable by
their talent for acting and their incontestable worth from a dramatic
point of view.... Equally capable of exciting laughter or of provoking
tears, endowed with an artistic temperament of great originality ...
which has permitted her making out of parts confided to her distinct
types ... in which she has represented personages whose nature and
characteristics are essentially opposed."... She died at Vence, near
Nice, September 22, 1905.
Fräulein Ehnn seems to have been the second Carmen; as Vienna was
the second city to produce Bizet's opera; the date was October 23,
1875. Brussels had the honour of being the third city; the date was
February 8, 1876; Mlle. Maria Dérivis enacted the rôle of the gipsy
here. Thereafter the opera made the grand tour of the world, and firmly
established itself in the répertoire of the meanest singing theatres.
Scarcely a singer but has at one time or other sung one of the rôles in
this work. Sometimes it has been Micaela (Mme. Melba, among others,
has sung this rôle); sometimes Frasquita, in which Emma Trentini made
an instantaneous impression in New York, more often than not Carmen
herself, for contraltos and sopranos have both appeared in the part.
Adèle Isaac, a soprano, sang the part when _Carmen_ was revived at the
Opéra-Comique in 1883. She did not make a very good impression but
the opera was received much more favourably than it had been in 1875.
When Mme. Galli-Marié reappeared she was again deemed matchless. Then
came Mme. Nardi. About 1888 Mme. Deschamps-Jehin sang the rôle. Mme.
Tarquini d'Or succeeded her. In December, 1892, Mme. Calvé disclosed
her characterization. It has been the custom in America to signalize a
vast distinction between her early and late performances of the rôle;
it has been said that she became self-conscious and wayward. Paris
always found her so, but it must be remembered that tradition must
be followed in the French theatre. Charles Darcourt's criticism in
"Le Figaro" the next morning is enough to give a Parisian impression:
He reproached her "d'être allée trop loin dans ses gestes et ses
attitudes, d'avoir été trop peu comme il faut, d'être sorti des limites
du bon goût et surtout du bon ton."... Mlle. Charlotte Wyns sang
Carmen in 1894. Mme. Nina Pack, Mme. de Nuovina and Mme. Marie Brema
followed her. In 1898 came Georgette Leblanc, who subsequently became
the wife of Maurice Maeterlinck. Mlle. Leblanc's interpretation was a
new one and she inspired one critic (Fierens-Gevaert) to put on paper
the following ecstatic lines about her appearance in the second act:
"Mlle. Leblanc is clothed in a long robe of plaited tulle, ornamented
with spangles. Her body, finely proportioned, is revealed by this
indiscreet drapery. Her nobly modelled shoulders and arms are bare. Her
hair is confined by three circles of gold, arranged in Grecian fashion.
Alma, gipsy, daughter of the East, princess of the harem, Byzantine
empress or Moorish dancer? All this is suggested by this fantastic and
seductive costume. But a more ideal image pursues us. The singer is
constantly urged by feminine visions of our ultra-modern poets. She
finds absolute beauty in the exquisite body of a woman animated by
a Florentine robe. And it is through this imaginary figure that she
composes her other incarnations; and in a tavern where gipsy women
meet soldiers, she evokes the apparition of a woman of Mantegna or
Botticelli, degraded, vile, who gives the idea of a shameless creature
that has not lost entirely the gracefulness of her original rank.
She is never weary of cheapening her original model. She is sensual,
impudent, voluptuous, gross, but in her white diction, in her blithe
walk, you divine her desire of evoking something else.... Carmen is,
according to Mlle. Leblanc, a hybrid, monstrous creature. You look
upon her with eager curiosity and infinite sadness.... Mlle. Leblanc
makes light of her voice. She maltreats it, threshes it, subjects it to
inhuman inflections.... Her singing is not musical, her interpretation
lacks the naïveté necessary to true dramatic power. Nevertheless, she
is one of the most emotional interpreters of our period. Her limited
abilities, hidden by a thousand details in accentuation, remind one of
the weak and ornate poetry of artistic degeneration.... Thanks to her,
Antioch and Alexandria, corrupt and adorable cities, live again, for an
hour."
Perhaps Philip Hale's description of Carmen owes something to this
picture of Mlle. Leblanc. At any rate it is striking enough to
reproduce:
"Carmen lived years before she was known to Mérimée. She dies many
deaths and many are her resurrections. When the world was young, they
say her name was Lilith, and the serpent for her sake hated Adam. She
perished that wild night when the heavens rained fire upon the cities
of the plain. Samson knew her when she dwelt in the valley of Sorek.
The mound builders saw her and fell at her feet. She disquieted the
blameless men of Ethiopia. Years after she was the friend of Theodora.
In the fifteenth century she was noticed in Sabbatic revels led by the
four-horned goat. She was in Paris at the end of the last century and
she wore powder and patches at the dinner given by the Marquis de Sade.
In Spain she smoked cigarettes and wrecked the life of Don José."