Word: victorian
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...dawn, the mists of spring float over the rolling green lawns of the village of Hinsdale, 25 miles west of Chicago. Petals from thousands of flowering fruit trees swirl down wide, brick streets and settle in pink drifts around sprawling Victorian houses. The casually wealthy suburb of 15,906 seems safe from any kind of drastic change, especially an energy shock. Says Louis Duncan, Hinsdale's president: "We are individually concerned about energy, but our life-style hasn't changed...
...sighing for one Reginald Bunthorne: poet and poseurpar excellence. Bunthorne's dedication, you see, is not so much to his art as to himself. His aestheticism, which issues in a poetry devoted to colocynth and calomel, is mere affectation, a ploy designed to elicit the admiration of his gullible Victorian public...
...fair, this spoof on late Victorian aestheticism and its pretentiously empyrean devotees is not sterling Gilbert & Sullivan. Patiencedoes have its share of Gilbertian humor, mostly deriving from the parody of aesthetic attitudinizing, and its plot is powered by the usual sort of Gilbertian paradox--in this case, an identification of love with duty which brands the love of anything worth loving as undutiful. But it lacks the consistently memorable score that distinguishes Pirates of Penzance, for example, or the brilliant comic sequences which make Iolanthea favorite...
TECHNICALLY, the most impressive aspect of Patienceis Linda Beyer's magnificent costumes. The contrast, for example, between the trailingly ethereal black and white gowns worn by the poetically enamoured female chorus and the multicolored Victorian dress they don near the end underscores the drama of their conversion from transcendental to commonplace. Roger Bardwell's set, a simulation of red brick, grey classical columns and yellow and green hedges is functional rather than aesthetically pleasing. Under the direction of David Crowe, the orchestra does an able job of executing Sullivan's difficult music...
...Easter Bunny. Now, upon his 75th birthday, the little creature betrays no signs of age-or, for that matter, maturity. Nor do Squirrel Nutkin, Jemima Puddle-Duck, Tom Kitten or any of the other animals in the watercolor menagerie of Beatrix Potter. The writer was a victim of Victorian repression -she did not leave home until the age of 47-and her prose is marked with arch names and marred with punishments for the nonconformist. Her artwork is another matter: from childhood, Beatrix commanded a delicate palette and an irrepressible whimsy. Her meticulous brushwork animated an entire barnyard world...