This book presents a complete account of the remarkable life
and career of Harriet Smithson Berlioz. Peter Raby''s success in
this book is to bring fully and sympathetically to life the
vulnerable woman and the working actress who is so generally
submerged beneath the myth that was created about her. At the same
time he provides a continually fascinating commentary on the
theatrical and cultural history of her time: on touring troupes in
Ireland; on the late Georgian theatre in London; on the different
acting styles and traditions in England and France; on the
economics of the theatre and the composition of the audiences; on
the intellectual background to Shakespeare''s belated acceptance in
France; on French translations of Shakespeare and contemporary
French critical essays and reviews; on the leading figures who
frame Harriet''s story - actors, painters, writers, and musicians
most notably, of course, Berlioz himself. Holding all together is
the complex figure of Harriet - a talented actress, and who for a
brief but crucial period in French cultural history became a symbol
and an ideal of the new, Romantic spirit.
目錄:
List of illustrations
Preface
1. Childhood in Ireland
2. Years of apprenticeship
3. The walking lady
4. Shakespeare in France
5. ''Fair Ophelia''
6. ''La Belle Irlandaise''
7. The idée fixe
8. Episodes in the life of an artist
9. Berlioz''s muse
10. The tragic dénouement
11. Romantic image
Notes
Bibliography
Index.