My lifelong love of opera began the day I heard Tosca in English. It
is such a dramatic piece, almost cinematic. I doubt hearing it first in
Italian would have had the same effect. Certainly, hearing other operas
in the original language did not. But when I heard this one, I suddenly
realized that opera was music AND drama and for the uninitiated, at least,
there is no drama when listening in a foreign language. As Puccini
certainly knew. In his day, opera was to be savored and its text
immediately understood by everyone. It was not just a jewel to be admired
from afar by the elite. Otherwise he'd have written Tosca in English. Or
Sanskrit.
Roger Hecht