Pelleas and Melisande

Description

In this Guide to Pelleas and Melisande, Maeterlinck's original play is reprinted in full, so that the opera lover can read the scenes that Debussy did not set to music. Hugh Macdonald's much praised English translation is published here for the first time, with an essay uncovering the musical roots of Pelleas and Melisande and illustrating its importance to the music of the twentieth century. Alain Raitt, author of several studies of Symbolist writers, evaluates Maeterlinck's status as a dramatist, and Roger Nichols analyses the score. Proust's short pastiche of the opera and Arthur Symons's review of the first English performances challenge us to come to terms with this eternally intriguing masterpiece.

Claude-Achille Debussy (1862 1918) is among the most important of all French composers, and a central figure in European music of the turn of the twentieth century. Debussy's work often reflected the activities or turbulence in his own life."

"Wholehearted recommendation of this valuable new series." "TLS""