Phantom of the Opera: How Much Did Opera Actually Influence Erik's Understanding of the World?
So, I love monster lit. A lot of folks know this if you've been following the blog.
I'm also a huge fan of opera. Like literal opera.
And, operas are really interesting because they're kind of, stylistically, marked by a couple of different things - style, forms, and whether they're tragic or comedic. However, you don't often get like ... blends? You can. Kinda. But, generally, like Shakespearean tragedies or comedies everyone's either gonna end up dead or married.
And, that made me think about Erik.
We have no darn clue how old he was per Leroux's timeline (because he was a prodigy and a genius) when he ended up under the opera house.
So, how many social experiences did Erik really have?
How much of his entire social world was filtered through the tragedy and comedy of opera?
Part of the reason I say this is because if you look at his relationship with The Persian it takes on flares of the sort of combative nature of operetic friendship. They fight. There's drama. They're rivals. Then, they're buddies. There's no stability. It's all drama, mostly put there by Erik.
But, again. That's what he knows! It's all he knows.
Even his relationship with Christine fascinates me.
If you look at his dialogue, he wants a friend.
He wants someone to hold his arm and take walks with him because he doesn't want to be alone. He wants someone to end his solitude. He wants to keep coaching her in music. He wants her to be the prima donna of the opera.
That's all he *really* says he wants.
Yet, he says he wants to marry her.
In comedic operas, everyone gets married in the end. That's how the happily ever after *works.* It doesn't matter if that's not what he actually wants, or if that's what she wants. It only matters that that's how the plot of the opera is supposed to work. In order to have stability, in order for the tragedy to stop, the marriage has to happen.
Erik fundamentally lacks the language of friendship.
He doesn't understand what it looks like, what it's supposed to feel like, what living is like, because he has no lived experiences of his own to draw from.
So, instead, he draws from the beautiful lyrical poetry of opera. He draws from what he knows and loves most to understand the world around him because it's all he HAS.
He uses the word "wife" because it's the only word he has to understand the complex intimate feelings he has for "best friend." He uses the word "wife" because marriage is the "fix-it" in almost all operatic comedies across all forms of comedy operas whether it's a Buffa (Think Barber of Seville) or Comique (This is probably what Webber was referencing with opera the chandelier crashes in although it could also have been an Operetta, as that incorporates dance, or perhaps it may have been a form of Grand Opera set in the current period, though that is less likely. It was likely a Comique because those were often about relatable characters in the current French culture of the 19th century. But, I'm getting in the weeds.)
Anyway, as soon as the world is brought to Erik, as soon as Christine recognizes his humanity, he is able to understand it.
One of my favorite, and perhaps the most important details in the Leroux text, is that Christine kisses Erik's *forehead.* She does not kiss his lips at any point in the story that I can remember?
In fact, Leroux seems to very intentionally make Erik and Christine's relationship quite asexual in nature. I never really noticed that as a young person, but I *did* very much notice it when I re-read the story as an adult. It's something I appreciate a lot about what Leroux seems to be doing and his commentary on human beings in general.
However, as soon as Christine recognizes Erik as a person, as soon as she kisses his forehead, he lets her go. He no longer wishes to marry her. It's like something is released in him, and he lets everyone he has been holding captive go. He no longer threatens to blow up the opera house and himself and everyone with it.
Christine and Raoul (who were childhood besties) run off together, and Erik dies of a broken heart.
But, if you look at his dialogue carefully, I don't think he dies because he wanted Christine romantically and didn't get to marry her. Instead, he compares her tears mingling with his to that of an angel's tears, and he goes on to talk about his *mother.* He talks about how his own mother never touched his face or kissed him. Yet, this girl looked at him, touched his face, and didn't die.
He fully expected anyone who kissed his face to die.
Yet, this perfect and pure angelic girl did not die when she kissed his forehead.
The way Erik talks in this is oddly paternal?
It's very different than the way he has spoken in past chapters of the novel.
In recognizing Erik's humanity, in bringing the world outside of operatic comedies or tragedies, Christine helped Erik make *sense* of the world, his feelings, and emotions. Marrying this girl is never what Erik really wanted.
He wanted a companion. He wanted a best friend. He wanted someone to walk with him when the world was too frightening after all the abandonment he had experienced.
And, his heart is broken knowing that he will never get to have that. He lost it in his own madness.
And, in that way, Leroux is right. We should pity Erik because if he had only been born a "normal" man he would have been a genius. But, things being what they were, he ended up lonely, confused, and broken hearted.
And, I would *love* to see an actor play Webber's Phantom in this way. Start him HUGE as though the only way he knows how to behave is in grandeur and, as the show progresses, make him more intimate. Take the energy from a 6 when we first meet him, up to a 10+ as Red Death, but then afterwards? Back down.
As he's losing it, he's softer. He's smaller. He's more intimate in his fury. He's scared.
So, at the very end, all is quiet. That final "Christine, I love you." And, he finally understands what that really means to him. So, it's just lightly sung. That exchange of rings is more pleasant. Nods are cordial. Maybe even a little hand clasp. There's understanding. It's soft. So, soft.
Even that last "It's over now, the music of the night?" So, stealthy. Don't belt. Just ... light. So light.
Like he's talking to himself and calling himself "Poor unhappy Erik."
As an autistic transmasc-nonbinary contralto. I would love to play this role. I can hit the notes enough to "pants" it in the original key too. I know. I've practiced.
So, anyway, thank you for coming to my TED-talk about why I think opera influenced Erik's understanding of relationship and how human kindness helped him to understand what he actually wanted for his real life.
germansingergirl
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