High culture, and in New Orleans at that.  This last Saturday, I wandered
over to Freeman Auditorium in the Tulane University Woldenberg School of
Art for a double lecture: the first on John Cage by a local composer,
during which, by way of illustration, he composed a "dice piece" and had
a French horn player with the Louisiana Philharmonic play the result;
the second about Cage's influence on artist Ellsworth Kelly, given by a
professor of the art school.  Both lectures were outstanding.  The one on
Cage not only made the ideas comprehensible, but made you see why Cage felt
the need to think them in the first place.

I also reread Peter Shaffer's Amadeus.  I had hated it for years as a piece
of pretentious tripe.  However, so many people on this list loved the thing
so much, I wanted to see whether I had merely indulged my natural dyspepsia
or given the play a fair chance.

What struck me this time around was how theatrically effective the work
is (I'm talking about the play, not the movie).  The scenes move like a
choo-choo train to the climax - a superior piece of craft.  In a way, this
highlights the intellectual and poetic poverty of the work - like seeing a
Federal portico on a tar-paper shack.  The play is, of course, the sickly
heir of Othello, also superbly crafted, and I tried to figure out the
reasons for the roar of Shakespeare's masterpiece and Shaffer's empty
little pop. For me, the answer lies in insight into the characters.
Salieri is easy to figure out; Iago less so, but several accounts of his
motivation can be considered.  Othello's character is similarly complex,
while Shaffer's Mozart is simply an excuse to motivate Salieri.  So Amadeus
is really not a meditation on the ways of genius.  It tells you nothing
about it (in fact, doesn't even try to account for the complexity of
Mozart's historical character), and, in fact, every time Shaffer goes near
the subject, he covers his lack of insight with theatrical hand-waving -
usually a Salieri diatribe against God.

The focus of the play is Salieri's jealousy (because that's the only thing
left), unlike Shakespeare's dual focus - Iago's hatred and the crumbling of
Othello's personality.  Again, however, Shaffer really doesn't seem to know
much about it.  Salieri has made a bargain with God: virtue in return for
musical genius.  Why does he think this? Does God make such bargains? Are
great composers paragons of virtue? When he sees Mozart, he goes nuts.
He tells a nice little ghost story (I think I saw a variation of it on a
Twilight Zone episode) about how he was a superstitious, small-town boy.
I can only assume, in spite of his travels and the exalted circles in which
he moves, he has learned nothing since then.  What an idiot.  Why should
anyone care about him? We are meant to care because of a trick: his victim
is Mozart.  That's the snob-appeal element.  Shaffer need do no work
whatsoever because he depends on our love of Mozart's music.  Try this
play before an audience of people who've never heard Mozart or change the
names to Saltimbocca and Marzipan (ie, two names without such exalted
associations), and I believe the play will lose much of its effect.
Shakespeare makes Othello great.  Shaffer depends on our knowing Mozart's
greatness.  In other words, Shaffer cheats.  The play becomes a compendium
of tricks, manipulations, and effects and contains about as much
intellectual and spiritual nourishment as, unfortunately, that other
little morality of jealousy and betrayal, Ian Fleming's Thunderball.

Steve Schwartz