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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2023
The devil has always been held in high esteem by composers of comic operas. Critics tend to be quite the opposite, and often go so far in their irreverence for the devil as to tweak him by the tail (isn’t that so, dear colleagues?).
The Opéra-Comique, let’s face it, has put on a multitude of works with the devil as their hero: The Devil and All, The Devil as Page, The Devil Lame, The Pink Devil, The Devil in Love, The Devil of Seville, The Devil’s Due, The Devil at School, The Devil’s Bride.
Devil take it! (This is me speaking now, in case you thought my exclamation was the name of another comic opera.) In 1830 the Opéra-Comique failed to get its hands on Robert le Diable (‘Robert the Devil’), which was really meant for it; but Monsieur Véron, a shrewd burgher of Paris who is full of devilment, managed with devilish cunning to have himself compelled by Ministerial order to open the great doors of the Opéra to the greatest devil that ever left Hell. For it weighed on his mind that the Opéra-Comique already possessed a fine collection of devils of every hue, while he at the Opéra had nothing to show but The Blue Devils.
Well, the insatiable Opéra-Comique could never get over the loss of Robert le Diable, and it was a long time, an age indeed, before that particular devil’s tunes raised the rafters there. Nothing went right for it; it made devilish efforts to attract the public, and the public avoided it like the very devil. Young actresses were engaged, young composers were “set to work”; but no, all these youngsters only led them the devil’s own dance before fading away in no time at all, while that devil of a Robert le Diable went on making a devilish din all over Europe and cast an infernal multitude into the abyss of the Opéra three times a week.
Here is a story which shows how respectfully and reverently the actors of the Opéra-Comique pronounce the evil spirit’s name. One day (yes, in full daylight), in a ceremony replete with sadness and solemnity, one of them had to deliver the eulogy on a composer of great talent who would practise his art no more.
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