Word: fausts
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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There are also two poems. One, fashionably devoted to the theme of postwar disillusionment, is called "Faust 1945" and reiterates the tired soldier's discovery that there's no solace for the sterile soul in drink, dames, or solace for the other, a sort of love lyric by the Advocate's new President, is called "Song," and succinctly continues the tradition of conventional obscurity which has become, one is tempted to say, a hallmark of the magazine. This particular poem is written in three four-line stanzas and makes no pretense of intellectual content. Instead, it tries to convey...
With 1,687 performances in 75 different roles at the Met to think back on (his most famed role: Mephistopheles in Faust), zestful, white-haired Basso Rothier had no fears about his anniversary recital. He was somewhat excited: "All my friends will be there to hear me and I will feel so at home there. My voice is still very good, you know, but it can't compare with the golden voice I once...
First, Maggie got them into a receptive mood with some Debussy, Fauré and Duparc songs. Then, on a darkened stage, with only a bare black backdrop for scenery, she marched to a lectern and began to narrate: "Behold Faust in his cell . . ." After a few more words in Poet Spender's potpourri of prose and poetry, recapping Faust's learning in "alchemy, and, alas, theology," she froze into a catatonic stare, and Faust, followed by Mephistopheles (Bass Arthur Newman) came on to sing (excellently). By the time the audience rushed out for air at intermission, they...
Maggie had put on her Faust with a lot of confidence. One old friend, Violinist Fritz Kreisler, told her, "You have put the pearls on a string." Most listeners found that they enjoyed the old pearls from Gounod's score more than they appreciated the new string-Poet Spender's often banal narration. But everyone agreed it was a bang-up show. Producer Maggie, who at 61 vows each year of singing on the concert stage will be her last, was happily thinking about taking her Faust on tour...
Later he actually wanted to be an actor, but failed; from play-acting he turned to playwriting. He read widely and weirdly; like Friedrich Schiller's heroes, he considered himself a rebel; like Kierkegaard, a pessimystic; like Darwin, a scientist; like Goethe's Faust, he turned to black magic (which he practiced in his attic). When he was crossed, he would roam the woods lashing at branches and hacking down young trees; sometimes he would climb a tree and yell defiance at the universe...