Walter Meyer wrote:

>But there *are* no explorations of the human condition or of ideas or
>emotions in Magic Flute!  (Again, w/ the exception of Papageno.) There
>are only recitations of platitudes.  What could be more superficial
>than Tamino's falling in love w/ Pamina upon seeing her picture?

But surely the Magic Flute is a fantasy, and surely fantasy is a
legitimate aspect of the human condition.  And Tamino's love is no more
superficial than Miranda falling in love with Ferdinand at first sight
in The Tempest, or than many other moments in Shakespeare's comedies,
for example.  According to Sidney, the purpose of art is to "delight"
and "instruct," or, as Chaucer suggests, to bring "sentence" (wisdom)
and/or "solas" (delight).  Granted, The Magic Flute is far over on the
"solas" end of the scale.

Now don't get me wrong; I do not mean to suggest that a twentieth-century
audience should react to the opera as a contemporary of Mozart's would
have.  I, too, prefer Figaro and Don Giovanni to the Magic Flute for some
of the very reasons you mention.  But my aesthetics and your aesthetics
are not the same as Mozart's or his audience.  Granted, Voltaire or other
eighteenth-century critics thought pure fantasy to be slight stuff, but
most of the "groundlings" who went to see The Magic Flute were, I think,
not in the least interested in depth of character or plausibility when they
went to the theatre to experience a fantasy.  It would be liking going to
the circus and being disappointed in the clowns' lack of plausible
motivation for trying to fit into that little car.

John Halbrooks