Opera II

In my previous post, I discussed the presence of opera in an eighteenth-century society that was otherwise officially hostile to influence from Catholic countries, dwelling on the perception of opera as a foreign, elitist art-form and the high salaries paid to opera stars compared to the far lower ones paid to British actors. These complaints can both be grouped into nationalist objections to foreign success on the London stage. Today, I want to discuss a related, but more abstract, grievance directed at opera: castrati, and what their popularity might suggest about expectations of manliness. I feel that this post lacks some structure and depth but I'm using it as an opportunity to flesh out some of my thoughts.

Castrati were the main stars of opera: from the late seventeenth century, the majority of male opera leads were written to be sung by a castrato.  The popularity of castrati meant that many became celebrities in their own right off the stage: we hear of Nicolini, Valentini, Senesino, and especially Farinelli enjoying the companionship of the nobility. The call from the theatre box of "One God, one Farinelli!" is infamous. However, such adoration had its seedier side. Popular mythology had it that women would view castrati as a viable option for sex without the potential to get pregnant. As a result, gossip, rumour, and satire suggested that castrati had numerous affairs and were frequent victims of syphilis.

But were the rumours about castrati true? Unfortunately, the process of castrating a young man for the purpose of preserving his beautiful voice has not been well recorded. From what we know of castration today, it usually inhibits sexual desire and ability to perform (the penis of a man who has undergone preadolescent castration usually remains infantile), thus making heterosexual copulation unlikely. It is possible that only a semi-castration took place, although this would be to the detriment of the beautiful voice associated with the castrato. Thus, either castration was total, and gossip surrounding castrati was exaggerated, or castration was only in part, and there was some truth in the rumours.

As men, castrati were unusual physical specimens. They had

more developed subcutaneous fat than in the normal male, with fat deposits localized in the hips, buttocks, and breast areas (some castrati developed large fatty breasts that looked like female breasts); fatty deposits that occurred sometimes in the lateral portions of the eyelids, creating facial distortions; and skin that often appeared swollen and unwrinkled…[T]heir arms and legs are disproportionately long relative to the torso… (Enid Rhodes Peschel and Richard E. Peschel, "Medical Insights into the Castrati in Opera," p. 582.)

Castrati were also unable to grow facial hair, which coupled with their high-pitched voices may have increased perceptions of them as boyish or feminine, although fashionable men of the 1720s and '30s were usually clean-shaven anyway. Contemporary caricatures of Farinelli especially emphasise his long limbs, as seen in this 1734 etching (Farinelli is the central figure, towering over the other two).

Castrati thus represented everything that was antithetical to eighteenth-century upper-class manly ideals: they were foreign, Catholic, often came from a lower class, drew their income from a frivolous art-form, had physical features more commonly associated with women, and lacked the 'proper' genitalia.  By all rights they should have been outcasts, but instead they enjoyed wealth and popularity with the aristocracy, and were rumoured to be sexually gregarious.

The adulation of castrati came at an awkward time for ideas about manliness. The Restoration rake, who drank, gambled, whored, and duelled, was reviled for being immoral; as his behaviours fell out of fashion, by the 1710s he also came to be associated with other old-fashioned and dangerous ideologies, like Catholicism and Jacobitism. Fops and beaus - with their delicate manners and love of aesthetic perfection - maintained their place in society, but they had always been criticised for their effeminacy and laughed at on the stage and in writing. The 'ideal' aristocratic man of the early eighteenth century thus developed consciously somewhere in-between, but also in opposition to, the immoral rake and the frivolous fop. This new man - for which, tellingly, I haven't been able to find a generic name or societal role for him to fulfil in the same way that 'rake' and 'fop' work - had to be mannerly and well-informed without sacrificing himself to fashion; he had to be practical and good-humoured without giving himself up to the pleasures of the world. By the 1720s, both rake and fop were perceived as pseudo-Catholic pleasure-seekers - it was therefore galling to see the castrato, associated with the same qualities, to triumph on the London stage. In the final post in this series, I will discuss reactions to castrati on the stage, primarily through the use of burlesque ballad operas and afterpieces.

Opera I

The stage was greatly preoccupied with the threat of a Jacobite rebellion in the early eighteenth century, and pieces such as Colley Cibber's The Non-Juror, which sought to show how misguided the Jacobite supporters were, saw brief but intense runs of popularity. Although theatrical attitudes towards Jacobite supporters varied depending on whether a play was written before or after the 1715 rebellion, the Jacobite threat remained a sensitive subject throughout the period. Jacobitism was a layered concern as the Pretender(s) represented two, related enemies to Whig ideas about Britain and Britishness: foreignness and Catholicism. The prospect of having James Francis Edward Stuart on the throne brought back bad memories of his father James II, and the political unease and crypto-Catholicism that characterised his brief reign, as well as the cultural hegemonies (such as libertine excess) of the broader Restoration period.

Thus when Britain turned to Germany to find an heir to Anne's throne, they were not suggesting that George I had a better hereditary claim to the throne than any Jacobite claimant - "he was only as 'English' as James was not" (Elaine McGirr, Heroic Mode and Political Crisis, p. 134). Rather, George would fit in with the reigning Whig, Protestant ideology far better than James Stuart - a Catholic who was supported by the French, Spanish, and later the Italians. In this they were largely correct: although George was subject to some lampoonery for his perceived unintelligence and inability to speak English, these were small offences compared to being Catholic. We can also judge that the royal household nevertheless tried hard to fit into London society, as newspapers of the time make frequent mention of various members attending the theatre. Whether or not they enjoyed the performances is something that is (I think) unexplored; the point is that they understood the importance of making social, public appearances.

With such a political backdrop, one might expect that the fashion was for entertainment that was a part of British (or English) traditionalism, or at least entertainment that celebrated Britishness. Indeed, nothing could be further from the case. It is true that some of the great Whig authors of this time - Cibber, Addison, Steele - wrote extensively in defence of what they considered British ideals, which they defined as Protestant, Whig, and anti-Jacobite. I shall discuss these in a later post. However, these plays were written in spite of the great fad of the 1700s: opera.

Opera had been popular to various degrees since its debut on the London stage in the late seventeenth century, but our interest really lies after 1705, when the Queen's Theatre, Haymarket opened and (after a spotty few seasons) became known for its dedication to opera. Opera was exceedingly fashionable by this point and opera stars accordingly were paid sums far exceeding their counterparts on the non-operatic stage. Beginning with the unheard-of amount of eight hundred guineas per annum probably paid to Nicolini from the 1708-09 season (Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume, "Opera Salaries in Eighteenth-Century London," p. 29), opera salaries only continued to rise astronomically, reaching their peak in the 1720s. By comparison, the actor Robert Wilks's salary for 1706 was £150 (Milhous and Hume, p. 28).

As such, opera's detractors found much to complain about. Opera was an expensive, elitist art, dominated by foreign, Catholic singers and composers. Its aesthetic and the thought behind it were condemned as frivolous and shallow, lacking the mindful pleasures that British drama could bring. Indeed, much criticism stemmed from the money and attention it took away from the British stage. Opera stars themselves were especially viewed suspiciously, as is anyone who rapidly ascends the ranks of society, acquiring massive fortunes along the way. In an age when performers were still legally defined as vagrants (Cheryl Wanko, Roles of Authority: Thespian Biography and Celebrity in Eighteenth-Century Britain, p. 14), it was galling for many to see such people - and those who represented qualities so antithetical to Whig-defined standards of Britishness - achieve such levels of public devotion and amounts of money. Thus, "The Opera House or the Italian Eunuch's Glory" lists along the side a catalogue "of the rich Presents Signior Farinello Italian Singer Condescended to Accept off of the English Nobility & Gentry for one Nights Performance."

Not all opera stars were Italian, not all operas were sung in Italian, and those which were sung by Italians in Italian did not have an explicitly Jacobite (or even pro-Catholic) message. Nevertheless, Italy could lay claim to the majority of opera stars and operas, and opera was forever coloured by its association with Catholic Italy. From 1717 Rome was the refuge of James Stuart, another mark against it. In a climate that could be very sensitive to any hint of Jacobite ideology, opera could easily be construed as an unattractive and even dangerous prospect. However, critics did not stop at criticising opera for its foreignness; nor were concerns about latent Jacobitism the sole motivators behind condemnation of the art. In my next post I will discuss castrati, gossip, and ideas about manliness in the eighteenth century.

A return to arms

It's been a long and weird year.

I spent a lot of my second year of study dancing around the subject. I think I was scared of the immense weight of the body of text available to me, and as a consequence I wanted to write about everything - a stance that isn't very conducive to a clear and concise thesis. Updating this blog had also become something I was scared of doing, because I often felt as though I should only update it if I had something meaningful to say, and it very rarely felt as though that was the case. The entry from 24th September 2011, "Losing My Way," is a good summation of my attitude for a lot of the past year.

I'm a great believer in harsh personal criticism, so I have no qualms about saying that my behaviour, in which I put off things I needed to do because I was too scared of doing them, was incredibly stupid. After all, who am I writing this blog for, if not for myself? I can't lie to myself in my own research notes, either.

The second-year blues hit me very hard and I took the long way round with regards to my research, something I wish I hadn't done. I hate the phrase, "I don't believe in having regrets," because the regrets I hold have been very important in shaping who I am. There are things I've done in my life (both personally and professionally) that I'm not proud of, or I wish I'd handled differently. Of course I regret the stuff I did and said when I was twenty-one - I was an idiot when I was twenty-one - and thinking about those things makes me cringe and want to do better. I don't let bad memories consume me, but they're a good motivator.

That's how I'm going to consider last year. I was an idiot, but it was a learning curve; as my supervisor said to me (rather ruefully): "Sometimes you need to explore all the wrong avenues to find out which one is the right one." Last year wasn't a total failure: I managed to get two publications and two conferences in. I wish I hadn't spent so much time exploring, but what's done is done and I've learnt from it. At least I finally feel better-grounded in the literature of the period.

Coming up in the next week: castrati, burlesque opera, and eighteenth-century fears about Continental maleness.