ABSTRACT

Italian opera was simultaneously popular and unfashionable in interwar Britain. It was popular with audiences from across the class spectrum. It was unfashionable with intellectuals who were anxious about its modularity, its collaborative model of production, and its interactions with popular culture and celebrity. This article considers the reception of Italian opera, its performers and audiences in interwar Britain, and the ways in which this intersected with broader discussions about taste formation and national identity in the so-called ‘battle of the brows’. Recent Italian operas – often likened at the time to cheap pot-boiler novels or films with mass market appeal – certainly complicated any claim that opera might be regarded as highbrow. Examining responses to such operas’ treatment of themes including religion and what one critic called ‘passionate love let loose’ can tell us much about how interwar Britons perceived both Italian culture and their own, at a time of vital cultural self-definition.

摘要

在两次世界大战期间，意大利歌剧同时流行又不合时宜。它受到了全班同学的欢迎。对于那些渴望其模块化，协作生产模式以及与流行文化和名人互动的知识分子来说，这是不合时宜的。本文考虑了意大利歌剧及其在战时英国的表演者和听众的接受程度，以及在所谓的“眉毛之战”中与味觉形成和民族认同进行更广泛讨论的方式。最近的意大利歌剧-当时经常被比作廉价的锅底小说或具有大众市场吸引力的电影-无疑使任何歌剧可能被视为高调的说法都变得复杂了。