Customer Reviews

The Book of 101 Opera Librettos: Complete Original Language Texts with English Translations

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book claims to offer complete original language texts. Unless Borodin, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky wrote their operas for Italian librettists, and Smetana for a German one, this is quite untrue. Where I have been able to check the translations against others, or can follow the original language myself, the translations offered are wooden and pretty inadequate. There appear to be extensive cuts in the libretti given, so that the book can hardly be described as complete. The choice of operas is somewhat strange. Only three by Mozart (not Cosi or Entfuhrung), but all ten of Wagners!). I purchased this book because I find nowadays that the print on the libretti given with CDs is becoming harder to read. While this book is rather clearer, the defects that I have outlined above make it in my view a very poor buy.

Opera is a unique and splendid art form. It combines glorious singing by soloists and ensembles, dramatic or comic acting, spectacular scenes on indoor and outdoor stages, light effects and vibrant music. All these effects depend on the lyrics contained in librettos as a paramount foundation stone. Popular and great composers paid a lot of attention to the libretto or "parola scenica" (scenic word) as Verdi defined it. Puccini struggled in search of suitable subjects for opera. Once he found them, he had stormy relationships with his librettists on lyrics, for him to get inspired and compose immortal melodies. Verdi had problems with librettists apart from censors, in his quest at compressing the action on stage for maximum dramatic effect. When he found a poetic genius (Arrigo Boito) to write for him, he dished out "Otello", a masterpiece of condensed poetry and music, which would have made Shakespeare proud of the opera based on his play. Wisely, Wagner went a stage further and wrote his own lyrics. This book under review is an innovative, monster compilation of famous and popular opera librettos, which will delight and inform operagoers. What is also very handy in the book is a faithful description (in the original language and English) of what goes on the stage. Of course, the book is heavy and thank goodness that it is a single volume, although the pages are thin paper. Otherwise, with more robust paper, there would have been the need of several volumes!
That said, reflecting on the importance of a libretto as foundation stone, I went about checking the accurate spelling of the Italian librettos (my mother-tongue) and how faithful the corresponding English translations were. On the book dust jacket, the editors wrote "COMPLETE ORIGINAL LANGUAGE TEXTS WITH ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS". I found a myriad of spelling mistakes in the Italian texts to make fire ants look like frightened and depleted hordes! As an example, in Luisa Miller (Verdi), Act II and Scene IV, the first 50 singing lines between Walter and Wurm have 18 spelling mistakes of the Italian language. Misspellings and absence of consonants and vowels, missing words and attachment of prepositions to words. It is a real bedlam! There is a claim that the English translations are full. Surely, they are full of sentences that do not correspond to the Italian ones. At times, the meaning conveyed sounds very poetic but is not faithful to the original intention. As an example, in Tosca (Puccini), Act III, Mario Cavaradossi, reminiscing one night of love with Tosca, sings "...mi cadea fra le braccia"(she fell in my arms) translated as "In her soft arms she clasped me" and "le belle forme disciogliea dai veli" (beautiful forms she disclosed from the veils) translated as "A thing of beauty, of matchless symmetry in form and feature!". This is very liberal translation, poetry within poetry!! I may accept the poetic versions in English but a very useful book of complete opera librettos with glaring spelling mistakes is inexcusable. Great pity, because the editors only needed to do a thorough spelling check of the Italian and all other original language librettos. Then, the book would have deserved 5 stars. There is still time and opportunity for the editors to do it. Their effort in producing a great book deserves more accolades than they received from readers so far.

I am a voice teacher,a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing, and a professional musician. I received this book as a gift. It looks expensive, (and unfortunately is) but cheaply printed on flimsy and cheap paper. Don't try to do any quick researching, or you'll rip it to shreds. And these are NOT word for word translations! They are the transcriptions for the English versions of the opera written to somewhat suit the music which was written for the original language. They would not be what is up on the supertitles at a live opera performance. And some operas have omissions, like some missing dialogue and lyrics from the original language and hence from the English. Take heed of the editorial review, because it does have strange inclusions, glaring exclusions, and goof ups like incorrect original languages. Only get this book if you are a student, and can't get or do your own better translations. If you want a really useful book, and you are an opera lover, but not as knowledgeable as you'd like to be, get the latest edition of the New Grove Book of Operas. Or even Kobbes. Or 101 opera stories. Skip this one. Save your money.

The pros and cons of this book are both the natural result of what it really is: a collection of reprinted, out-of-copyright libretti from the 1900s and 1910s. These are the libretti you would have seen for sale if you'd attended the Met a hundred years or so ago, newly typeset but otherwise unchanged.

This is good in that it lets us get 100 libretti cheap; there's no way the publishers would have been able to afford new translations of everything.

On the other hand, this means that the selection is a bit odd. In general, only librettos from 1921 and before are going to be out of copyright, which explains why operas (like "Turandot") composed after that date can't be included. This also explains why operas such as "Cosi fan tutte", which was rarely if ever performed in most American opera houses, are absent--Cosi didn't really enter the American repertory until the 1950s Met production.

In addition, the book can only present the versions of the operas as they were performed at American houses at that time. This means that the book omits materially traditionally cut by whatever house they got the libretto from (most likely the Met). If that house performed a Russian opera in Italian translation, you'll get an Italian and English libretto in this book as well. And the English translations themselves are generally fairly archaic and flowery, as was the style in American opera houses at the time.

So if your needs are the same as an early 20th century opera attendee--getting a general idea of the story or a more-or-less accurate copy of the original-language libretto--then this is a good value. I find it a very useful resource just because it is so comprehensive. But if you're looking for a deep understanding of an individual libretto, or a quality modern English translation, you'll need to look elsewhere.

I bought this book and had it shipped to my grandmother for Christmas - thanks to Amazon.com. My grandmother cannot thank me enough. Sure this book is too heavy to take to the opera but it is a great reference previous to seeing an opera and it is also great to read along to any opera that you have on CD at home. It is informative and easy to follow.

My one problem with this anthology of librettos is that it lacks a libretto for Puccini's Turandot, one of my favourite operas-and one of the more popular ones(!).

Otherwise, this is probably your best bet for a general collection of librettos, particularly for the price. The way it's set up is that there are four columns on each page, and each pair of columns is the original text and the English translation, which is probably the best way to set up a collection of this size without making it an ungodly amount of pages (don't worry, the print is big enough to read). Librettos are aranged alphabetically by composer.

While I was disappointed to see it had not included Turandot, it does have some lesser-known operas that I still find beautiful (I was particularly surprised to see Mignon in it).

Jessica MacMurray has a particular flair for creating translations appealing to the modern eye, and Allison Franzetti comes up with some wonderful plot summaries that appear at the beginning of each libretto.

With a wonderful array of operas and near-perfect translations, 101 Opera Librettos certainly does live up to the boast on its cover that it is the most comprehensive one volume collection of unabridged opera lyrics ever published.

Although I have read the negative reviews about this book on this site and agree with some of them, I must say this book is very useful to me as an aspiring opera singer. I use this book to read through the texts while I listen to the opera and compare translations. I never use this or any other translation except for my own or the ones given in Word by Word Translations of Songs and Arias for my own reference; however I do find it helps my understanding sometimes to get a general flow of the text by reading here and through other texts of opera librettos. I think this book for the layperson is very helpful and much more convenient than just reading the basic plot scenario that most other books offer, even with its errors. I also think, as a singer, it is an essential part of my own research and though it isn't always perfect, I haven't found better out there for this part of my research process.

I like to read the librettos of the operas I am going to see each season before actually going to the performance. This book is a steal at the $price tag I paid. (Using rapid mathematics, that comes to <a$... per translation, folks!) Yes it is a big, big book, but how much room would it take to store 100 small paper librettos and then what do you have - icky little paper books. This has readable print for those who find regular paperbacks readable. Comparing the few translations that I have read before and seen the operas before, these are quite comparable and quite acceptable. And I should say, every translation will in fact vary slightly.

This book is put out by Black Dog Publishers. I own every one of the Black Dog Opera Library issues (all 14 is it?) They are wonderful at giving you the libretto, the COMPLETE music on 2 cds, the history, the previous performers, etc. I wish they had more available. However, this book fills in nicely within my opera collection.

This book is an excellent value with great content.

I enjoyed the convenience of having all this in one handy place. The book is really an incredible reference, and I can't recommend it enough.

Jessica M. MacMurray and Allison Brewster Franzetti have assembled a rich and thorough resource for opera buffs and novices alike.

This work affords the reader a chance to become friendly with a opera before attending its performance. Different than the seminal 100 Great Operas and Their Stories, the Libretto book offers the pure nature of the language without commentary. As a recent subscriber to a local company's 1999-2000 series, I savor the opportunity to "study-up"!