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Intimacy in Four Operas by Benjamin Britten

Author(s)

Yufan Lou

Affiliation(s)

The University of Hong Kong, Pok Fu Lam Road, Central and Western District, Hong Kong, China

Abstract

Benjamin Britten is a famous genius composer in England, who left several operas with distinctive personal characteristics in his life. In these operas, there is also a lot of detail about his characters in the intimate relationship as an expression of the stance to argue against the stereotypes of the gender relationship in the art. Many of Britten’s operas deal with the relationship of males and males in love. And some even have specific contexts of same-gender emotional affiliations. In critical interpretations, opera can be understood as an artistic medium through which Britten explores and projects emotional experiences[1]. His partnership with Peter Peirce, who was also a major actor in many of his operas, was an important drive for spirits to write his opera. Their private relationship has informed biographical readings of the emotional relationships represented in the operas. The relationship between Billy Budd and the captain, who are the main characters in the opera Billy Budd, is believed to be related to Britten’s own love experience. In some of his operas, including Billy Budd, and Death in Venice, same-gender emotional affiliations and sexual orientation are explored topics in these operas. These works have been interpreted as Britten’s attempt to express his values and opinions on intimate relationships and love in music based on his identity, his experience, and society’s attitude towards people with same-gender emotional affiliations. This paper intends to analyze Benjamin Britten’s discussion of intimacy from four operas, Peter Grimes, The Turn of the Screw, Billy Budd and Death in Venice.

Keywords

Benjamin Britten; British Opera; Intimacy; Same-Gender Emotional Affiliations; Social Discrimination; Musical Expression

References

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