The Community of Arts

Emily Dickinson

NBC-TV carries away cultural honors this month. One of the most ominous recent notes in discussions among broadcasters, however, is the threatened disappearance of the spectacular--the big-budget, ninety minute show, in which category are most programs of high cultural value. If larger audiences do not materialize for these programs, they will disappear from network schedules, to be replaced by formula shows, cheap to produce and ephemeral by design.

La Traviata by Verdi (NBC Opera Theatre, 2:00-4:30 p.m., NBC-TV, February 10) stars Elaine Malbin as Violetta, John Alexander as Alfredo, and Igor Gorin as Germont. The opera is based on the "Camille" story. For study suggestions see George Huddock's essay in February 1957 Clearing House. Your students will appreciate the NBC Opera Company's efforts to bring operas in English to the American public; see Chandler Cowle's explanation in October 1956 Clearing House. Superior students should study W. H. Auden's translation of Mozart's The Magic Flute (Random House) for an earlier NBC Opera presentation.

The last announcement is best of all: Julie Harris will recreate her Broadway role in Jean Anouilh's The Lark (Hallmark Hall of Fame, 9-10:30 p.m., February 10). Compare this version with Siobhan McKenna's RCA Victor recording of Bernard Shaw's Saint Joan, to be reviewed here next month. Tape the soundtrack of The Lark for an introduction to comparative aesthetics.

RECORDINGS
A composer's pleasure in a piece of literature frequently leads him to the sincerest of compliments: a composition based on that writer's work. Such musical tributes provide the English teacher with a sound rationale for introducing students in literature classes to contemporary music. Several of these musical variations on literary genius have recently monopolized this department's hi-fi: Virgil Thomson's "Five Songs from William Blake" (Columbia LP, ML 4919), Aaron Copland's "Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson" (Columbia LP, ML 5106), and Igor Stravinsky's "In Memoriam Dylan Thomas" and "Three Shakespeare Songs" (Columbia LP, ML 5107).

The Thomson disc is perhaps the best one for in-class use. Mr. Thomson wrote: "It was my hope in selecting these poems to give a compact but complete view of Blake's humane philosophy. I did not attempt to include his prophetic ideas, as expounded in the hermetic writings." The five poems set to music, with Mack Harrell's baritone voice and the Philadelphia under Ormandy, are "The Divine Image," "Tiger! Tiger !," "The Land of Dreams," "The Little Black Boy," and "Did Those Feet." Highly recommended.

The Copland and Stravinsky are both interesting but perhaps more suitable for a classroom library. Somehow Martha Lipton's voice and Copland's music don't seem to embody the spirit of the poetry as effectively as the Blake recording does; and Stravinsky's advanced musical style would probably be too steep for most students. "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" is the Thomas poem presented by Stravinsky.

The essential point of the "community of arts" is made clearly by this kind of recording. There are other ways to illustrate this same concept of the cross-fertilization of aesthetic traditions: the operatic presentation of Shakespeare's plays; the Leonard Bernstein-Lillian Hellman-Richard Wilbur musical comedy based on Voltaire's Candide; the musical comedy Lil' Abner, wherein the lowly comic strip stimulates the Broadway stage; the musical embodiment of the Greek myths. The LP is going to allow us to destroy the false image of literature as isolated from the other arts.