Robert Peters wrote:

>2) The operas libretto is openly racist and misogynous.  I am no regualar
>guest in opera houses.  How do modern productions deal with these
>tendencies of the libretto? Thanks for any hints,

'Openly racist and misogynous' are too strong words.  Because Queen of the
Night and her Three Ladies are women and Monostratos has dark skin? Lady
Macbeth is a woman too.  Almaviva calls Bartolo 'mammalucco'.  Does this
make 'Macbeth' 'misogynous' or 'The Barber' 'racist'? 'Magic Flute' is not
anti-ecological because of the role animals act!  The play is not about
bad women and good men, even if (according to some traditional artistic
customs) some women represent dark sides of the world.  Queen of the Night
is not a cruel woman, but a cruel person.  Monostratos is not 'black=bad'
but perhaps 'bad because black', bad because he is different and thought
about as being worse.  Otello's problems come to mind.  Taking Magic Flute
(a tale!) or any other play literally makes them flat.  Neither 'Don
Giovanni' is a feminist opera, nor 'Cosi Fan Tutte' is anti-feminist.
General ideas have their representatives on stage.  People have to be men
or women, dangerous animals have to be snakes or lions or belong to any
other (real or imaginary) species.  What the author wants to tell us lies
deeper.

Krzysztof Lorentz
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