My week? Two lunches and the concert version of Madama Butterfly at the Palace in aid of the Community Chest Fund, with the editing of the bumper issue of First thrown in. I need ten hours sleep at a stretch but know I shall not get them. To attend anything that happens at the Palace is already a treat because even if, over the years, one has been there on several occasions, it loses none of its allure. In this Palace of the knights, enjoyment starts even as you go up the beautiful staircase. Unhappily an 82 year old who was climbing the stairs to the frescoed Chamber, for this enjoyable evening, dropped dead I am told. But it is not a bad way to go, at 82, on your way to doing something which still interests you at that age, although no doubt a shock to his family.
Puccini, like Verdi, can do no wrong for most of us. When you consider that Madama Butterfly was first performed at La Scala in February 1904 and remains solidly in our affections, one knows that Puccini has done something very right. At La Scala the première turned out to be a fiasco due probably in large part to organized opposition by the composer’s enemies. Puccini wrote to a friend: “The first performance was a Dantean Inferno, prepared in advance.” But he refused to be discouraged, made his revisions and three months later, in a smaller theatre than La Scala he staged it again in Brescia. The second version of Madama Butterfly was an instant and triumphant success.
I remember reading, many years ago, that this opera is based on Pierre Loti’s Madame Chrysanthème the French novel of Japanese manners, a precursor also of Miss Saigon. Pierre Loti was a much read novelist in Mauritius. Women from the sugar estates would come with their chauffeurs to the Carnegie town library I ran for a while, and would hand him half a dozen Pierre Loti novels to carry back to their BMW or Mercedes. Between dinner parties and visits to the hairdresser they did a great deal of reading. They were served hand and foot on the estates and whiled away the time reading French novels and yes, Nostradamus. They loved him.
In Madame Chrysanthème the young naval officer whose ship pays a visit of three months’ duration to Nagasaki, tells how to while away the time, he enters into a temporary marriage with the geisha known as Madame Chrysanthème. When he was to rejoin his ship, they part with no regrets on either side. Loti’s heroine and her French naval officer are clearly the inspiration for Madame Butterfly and Lieutenant Pinkerton, thoughthere is no element of tragedy in the brief, idyllic affair of Chrysanthème, the naval officer, and hardly any sentiment at all in their parting, at least on the Frenchman’s part: To quote Pierre in the book: “…Come, let us part good friends. Let us even embrace, if you wish. I took you for my own amusement and, although you may not have been a total success, you gave me what you could: your little body, your respect, and your quaint little music. All in all, you have been sweet enough in your Nipponese way. And, who knows, perhaps I shall think of you from time to time, in a roundabout way, when I recall this glorious summer, the pretty gardens, and the music of the cicadas.”
On the threshold she prostrated herself, her forehead pressed to the ground, and remained in this position of extreme respect all the time I was visible to the pathway which was leading me away from her forever.
As I walked further away from the house, I turned around once or twice, but merely out of politeness and in order to make the correct response to her beautiful final mark of respect.”
That is the book. Pinkerton in the opera is no less callous. He leaves Japan and then marries his American sweetheart. But in the meantime Butterfly has had his son and hopes he will return to her. He does, but with his wife who visits Butterfly to take away her son with them to America. Butterfly begins to understand that Pinkerton will never return to her and brokenhearted she takes her father’s dagger, reads its inscription ‘He dies with honour who can no longer live with honour and goes behind a screen and kills herself.
At the end of the opera at the Palace, my sister said to me, mirroring my exact reaction: “Women no longer behave like that. They are not so silly these days.” Thank goodness they don’t for now they have more respect for themselves these days and realise that a man who suffers from the Pinkerton syndrome is not worth a single thought let alone a fatal dagger. Of course men, even now, are turning more and more to places like Thailand, the Philippines and other countries where there is poverty, to shack up with women who are submissive, non-assertive and obey them. Maltese too, are leaving their wives and going to Thailand I am told, and living the rest of their lives with poor Thai girls who have little choice if they are to eat their daily bread and have a roof over their heads but to give themselves to some gross westerner. Many young men are undergoing sex changes it seems as it is far more lucrative being a woman than a man in countries like this, for those who prefer the opposite sex. The paedophiles are a different species altogether of course.
I enjoyed this concert version of Madama Butterfly but particularly the singing of Rosa Lee Thomas who was born in Korea and has a wonderful soprano voice. Suzuki was beautifully sung by Kate McCarney though I must say I have never before seen such a docile and nunlike Suzuki before, but her voice more than made up for it. The women’s voices definitely stole the show this time round. An excellent evening.
A delicious lunch hosted by Go Mobile at the MaltaHilton’s Blue Elephant was, as ever a treat. I saw, for the first time, Ramona Depares who has left the editorship of The Circle – now in Sarah Puntan Galea’s hands, and joined the without a doubt less stressful corridors of Go Mobile. I haven’t seen Ramona look so relaxed for a long time. Desktop publishing is far more demanding than many jobs and Ramona is going to be an asset to Go Mobile. Why, she is already inundating us with press releases, photos and goodness knows what else. So although this is a more relaxed job if only because deadlines are not so severe, there are still many demands made on one’s time. I wish her well.
Especially honoured to be invited to luncheon at The Peak the Saturday before last by The Plaza committee. The CEO, Lionel Lapira, who I had interviewed for First, is always genial and light on these occasions, though I know few men who take their responsibilities as seriously. Gerald Zammit is a worthy successor to his brother Julian and thanks to people like them, The Plaza is probably one of the best kept and most elegant and popular shopping malls in Malta and we love shopping there. A delightful lunch and a delicious one as well and greatly honoured that I was the only press journalist invited. It was an excellent interlude to a very heavy month.
I came across a Mark Twain quotation the other night and I’d like to share it with you. “Dance like nobody’s watching. Love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening. Live like it’s heaven on earth.”
I think it’s brilliant.