The Contribution Of Feminist Criticism To Opera Studies - Essay Example

?The contribution of feminist criticism to opera studies Introduction The struggle for women’s rights has been lasting for long, however, it is not going to be finished. This can be explained by the fact that this struggle cannot reach its main point completely. In order to defend the position of a woman and stop discrimination, feminism penetrates all the spheres of life. As the old values of the society have been formed for a long time and are reflected in the works of art, it became necessary for the strugglers for human rights to make feminist movement influence the sphere of art. Old plots of classical art creations are very popular today and widely used by producers for their performances. However, feminists claim that many of these plots should be modified. The trouble is that they plunge us into the past values and traditions feminists did their best to change. As the plots are too old, the representation of women is usually too discriminative and reminds men about their dominance in the past. Under such influence the efforts of feminists risk to come to nothing, thus they consider it necessary to impose their effect on the sphere of the modern art. The given paper will provide the overview of the feminist influence in the sphere of mass media and demonstrate how the modern opera is affected by the feminist movement. The main argument of feminists is the “male gaze” that can be traced in modern performances. Notwithstanding that feministic mood penetrated many fields, the sphere of film-making remained almost unchanged. It keeps using motives, which are considered to be classical, in spite of the fact that they were formed in the patriarchal society. A woman continues playing secondary role. Boetticher explains: "what counts is what the heroine provokes, or rather what she represents. She is the one, or rather the love or fear she inspires in the hero, or else the concern he feels for her, who makes him act the way he does. In herself the woman has not the slightest importance."1 If to trace the literary works on the topic, it becomes clear that the problem was started to be considered by the strugglers for women’s rights already in 1970s. The work by Mulvey titled "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" discussed the secondary role and discrimination of women. The author states: "in their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness," and as a result contends that in film a woman is the "bearer of meaning, not maker of meaning.”2 The author draws the readers’ attention to the theory of Lacan that explains how the performances contributes to gender discrimination by depicting women as objects for sexual exploitation. Mulvey emphasizes the importance of re-consideration of the plots used to make performances. She states that the radical changes in the film-making structure are crucial as it is the only way to eliminate gender discriminative motives from modern performances. The issues of women discrimination in opera was discussed in the book by Catherine Clement. The feministic work “Opera: The undoing of Women” were created at the end of 1970’s. The author strongly believes that in opera women are oppressed and men dominate over them. She underlines that women in opera are portrayed as victims, who cannot express their own feelings and who sacrifice their lives for their beloved men. The life of these women in most situations has a tragic end. Really, it is possible to trace that most of the female protagonists appear in difficult circumstances and they are always unhappy and dissatisfied. In order to prove that it is enough to overview the most famous plots that are depicted in opera. The main heroine of “Tosca” Floria has committed suicide after she got to know about the execution of her beloved. The opera “Madam Butterfly” is rather popular, but if to consider it from critical point of view, it is plot is appalling. It shows the delicate geisha, who finished her life by hara-kiri, when she got to know that Pinkerton chose another woman. The next is the famous “Tristan and Isolda”, one of the most favorite and pleasant plots, which, unfortunately, also can disappoint by its discriminative motives. Isolda decided to die, because she could not live without her beloved, Tristan. At last famous Carmen was killed by her ex-lover. Actually Bizet’s Carmen is one of the most disputable opera. Smart states: “Carmen has been a favourite object of feminist study, not only because of the overt sexual politics- and sexual violence- of its plot, but because its heroine can be understood to bring death upon herself, willfully and knowingly, by her persistent pleasure in singing, dancing, and loving where and as she pleases – all of which daring pursuits amount to pretty much the same thing within the universe of nineteenth-century opera.”3 As we can notice there are a lot of such examples of opera performances, where women are victims. We also can add two more cases. In operas “La Traviate” and “La Boheme” the major heroines have quite similar destinies. Both of them died after the reunion with their lovers. The reason of their death was not suicide or cruel murder, the reason was illness. They died from tuberculosis. This demonstrated the impossibility for women to be happy in this world. The book by Catherine Clement was based on the criticism of such scenarios. This book was translated into English and is used in many female studies, which contains the debate on such issues as gender, identity, power and cultural diversity. The goal of these studies is to find out how the relations between men and women are influenced by the music and art. The main goal of Clement and other feminists is to show and prove that women are under pressure, to demonstrate the domination of men in literature creations. The book by Clement shows that she is eager to resolve this problem, but lacks the methods how to struggle with it. This book provides a perfect start to analyze deeply the role of women in opera and the subsequent influence imposed on men, when they listen to such music and see such performances. As usual the heroines in opera just play their secondary roles and agree with these roles. According to feminists, such scenarios provide more power to men, and the main task is to provide women with some power. The strugglers for female rights state that the only efficient method to achieve this goal is to change the traditional roles of female. Mary Ann Smart in her book “Siren Songs: Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Opera” criticizes the approach of Clement or rather expands it. She argues that Clement pays attention only to the fact of death, but this is not the most important issue that can be traced in old plots. The author emphasized the lack of respect towards women in opera: “they remind people how to show deference to the king and other superiors, especially fathers. They could demonstrate how to treat brothers, how to identify and resolve conflict between family and state. One thing they did not teach – or taught only by negation – was how to view mothers”4 Every opinion has a right to exist and no one can argue this statement. However, there are many experts, especially art critics, who argue that feminists pay very little attention to the opera as to an art masterpiece. They are accused in the lack of understanding music plays and their important role that goes beyond the scene they show. All the actions are accompanied by the greatest music. Critics are sure that if to consider the problem from this side, it is possible to see that by showing so tragic destiny of heroines the composer gives them a chance to express their feelings. Usually the greatest parts of the opera belong to women. The importance of plot is incomparable with the music. Experts state that the Women’s Studies programs take only one side of the problem and, actually, not the most important one. Talking about discrimination one should be very specific. It is much easier to show the evidences, but when you are talking about the opera, music bears the palm. Art critics also wonder, what results feminists want to have. If they state that the plot of operas is too discriminative, they can demand to cancel or rewrite the operas. In the field of art it is sometimes considered to be a crime. The fact is that people accept such interpretation during so long period of time and they just love it. Speaking about our society and the results of feminist work, it is possible to notice that during the last years, when the society has become more democratic and ready to accept equal rights, many changes were made. In this case the question is if the changes of operas create new ones and whether it is not the violation of the authors’ rights. If feminists do not want to listen to such operas, it is their right, but the question is what right they have to change classical art masterpieces which are first of all created to provide people with opportunity to listen to favorite music created by great composers. These masterpieces should not be underestimated only because of the drawbacks of our history. However, this issue can be also considered from another point of view. It is enough to recollect one case that was shown in the movie “Everybody does it”. It is a comedy that shows a woman with a dream to become a famous singer in opera. The movie began with the attempt of the wife to make her husband listen to the opera, and he slept during all the performance. Now the problem is quite different. Now that husband would not sleep at all, because he would have a chance to see the “Idomeneo” by Amadeus Mozart, expecting terrorist attack, as opera portrays split heads of Buddha, Poseidon, Jesus and Mohammed. Such performance can be considered as an insult of the great prophets. The plot can provoke a terrorist attack of the Mohammed followers. When the Berlin Opera administration got to know about that, he immediately refused the performance. Such reaction has become typical in the modern world5. In this case greater attention should be paid to the composers’ perception and their views of the problem. Much depends on the choice of what they would like to depict. There should be a space for the individuality of the composers, despite that fact that this individuality could provoke much dispute. Concerning the “Idomeneo” you can find other disputable cases on the religious base. Jews could wonder why Moses was forgotten, if all the famous prophets were depicted. Moreover, it is enough to remember “Salome” by Richard Strauss, where religious motives are represented as well. In this opera the head of the Jesus was depicted on a plate. It is clear that all of this was done in order to strengthen the perception effect and the main attention was paid to the music. The question is if the plots of these plays are changed on the basis of religion motives due to the changes, which happened in the society, why the representation of women and their role remains unchanged on the sexual and gender motives. Feminists wonder why terrorist attacks can stop the performances and the voices of women are unheard. This testified about the neglecting attitude towards women in the society6. If this neglecting attitude is still present, something should be done about it to make men respect women. Conclusion The work of feminists does not bring fast results and the sphere of art has remained unchanged for years representing suffering and humiliated women on the stage. As we can see, this problem can be considered from different points of view. Feminists are quite right accusing opera in being conservative, but the question is if the plots of famous masterpieces should be changed. Certainly, they should not be and can’t be. It is incorrect and impossible to change the plot of classical musical creations, but it is really possible and correct to eliminate some scenes, which are too discriminative or influence the perception of such things. Those who listen to opera, especially our children, should comprehend such plots as something that is wrong and should be changed. We should consider them to be an integral part of our history and something that should not serve as an example. This is the most important way of how feminists influence modern opera. It is essential to make people understand what our history really means to us, to make them see the good and bad in it and to approach it critically. We can’t change history, but can change our attitude to it. Moreover, speaking about opera, we should not pay attention only to plot, but first of all to the music, perfect creations of famous composers, which are masterpieces and should never be changed or forgotten. It is important to understand that opera is created for those who like classical music and the plots play secondary role. References Erens, Patricia. Issues in Feminist Film Criticism. Indiana University Press, 1990 Smart, Mary Ann ed. Siren Songs : Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Opera. Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, c2000 Abel, Samuel D. Opera in the Flesh: Sexuality in Operatic Performances . Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996 Blackmer, Corinne E and Patricia Juliana Smith, ed. In Travesti: Women, Gender, Subversion, Opera. New York: Columbia UP, 1995 Read More