文章基本信息

标题：Duality and Ambiguity in Britten’s Death in Venice
本地全文：下载
作者：Lucy Y. Liu
期刊名称：Nota Bene : Canadian Undergraduate Journal of Musicology
印刷版ISSN：1920-8979
电子版ISSN：1920-8987
出版年度：2009
卷号：2
期号：1
出版社：University of Western Ontario
摘要：In September 1970, English composer Benjamin Britten began working on his last opera, Death in Venice, which is based on Thomas Mann’s novella of the same title. Death in Venice tells the story of a well-respected writer, Gustav von Aschenbach, and his infatuation with a beautiful Polish boy, Tadzio, whom he meets while on holiday in Venice. Both the opera and novella detail Aschenbach’s subsequent physical and moral decline, culminating in the protagonist’s death due to Asiatic cholera. Mann’s dense prose is fraught with irony that gradually reveals Aschenbach’s true feelings, feelings that he suppresses in selfdenial. In this vein, the opera is rife with double natures and ambiguities, which can be traced from both a narrative-symbolic and musical perspective. Three prominent themes emerge in Britten’s work: the Venetian setting, the dynamic between the Apollonian and the Dionysian, and irony centering on repression and ontology. Musically, Britten’s setting clarifies and interprets these abstract themes through the use of characteristic motives, instrumentation, vocal casting, harmony, and tonal conflicts.-