#leroux manuscript

[fdelopera]

Welcome to the 7th installment of 15 Weeks of Phantom, where I post all 68 sections of Le Fantôme de l’Opéra, as they were first printed in Le Gaulois newspaper 115 yeas ago.

In today’s installment, we have Part II of Chapter 3: “Où pour la première fois, MM. Debienne et Poligny donnent, en secret, aux nouveaux directeurs de l’Opéra, MM. Armand Monchardin et Firmin Richard, la véritable et mystérieuse raison de leur départ de l’Académie nationale de musique” (“Where for the First Time, MM. Debienne and Poligny Secretly Give the New Managers of the Opera, MM. Armand Moncharmin and Firmin Richard, the True and Mysterious Reason for Their Departure from the National Academy of Music”).

This section was first printed on Friday, 1 October 1909.

For anyone following along in David Coward's translation of the First Edition of Phantom of the Opera (either in paperback, or Kindle, or from another vendor -- the ISBN-13 is: 978-0199694570), the text starts at, “La Sorelli, a glass of champagne in her hand and the little speech she had prepared on the tip of her tongue, was waiting for the outgoing Directors to arrive” in Chapter 3 and goes to, “I shall now let M. Moncharmin take up the story.”

In this section, there are some differences between the Gaulois text and the standard First Edition text.

1) The Gaulois text contains the half-paragraph highlighted in red above, which was omitted from the First Edition:

Nevertheless, some of those who knew Debienne’s temperament and pride, as well as Poligny’s people skills, resilience, and business acumen, remained surprised that they had both thrown in the towel so soon; and that is what was still being discussed on that farewell evening in the dance foyer, where La Sorelli was awaiting the outgoing managers, with a glass of champagne in her hand and a little prepared speech on the tip of her tongue.

In the First Edition, this half-paragraph was replaced by:

Tout ce monde s’était donné rendez-vous au foyer de la danse, où la Sorelli attendait, une coupe de champagne à la main et un petit discours préparé au bout de la langue, les directeurs démissionnaires.

Translation:

Everyone had arranged to meet in the dance foyer, where La Sorelli was awaiting the outgoing managers, with a glass of champagne in her hand and a little prepared speech on the tip of her tongue.

2)  “La petite Saint-James” has become “la petite Jammes.” Leroux must have changed his mind about her name after the beginning of the Gaulois publication, since she appears as “la petite Saint-James” throughout Leroux’s original manuscript.

You can read Leroux’s handwritten manuscript in its entirety here.

3) In the Gaulois text “de mains en mains” becomes “de main en main” in the First Edition (describing the Managers’ keys being passed “from hand to hand”).

4) Minor differences in punctuation.

Click here to see the entire edition of Le Gaulois from 1 October, 1909. The link brings you to page 3 of the newspaper — Le Fantôme is at the bottom of the page in the feuilleton section. Click on the arrow buttons at the bottom of the screen to turn the pages of the newspaper, and click on the Zoom button at the bottom left to magnify the text.

[m2-km]

Persian (modern-day Afghan) warrior showcasing a cummerbund.

Peculiarities on the Rue de Rivoli (<- READ HERE)

Catalogue Gaston Leroux

Item 528: Unfinished manuscript found in the author’s study in his house in Nice. It is entitled "Peculiarities on the Rue de Rivoli: Or, a Mysterious Encounter".

Contents: In the midst of the Bloody Week of the Paris Commune, the Persian finds two unexpected visitors outside his flat on the Rue de Rivoli.

(No knowledge of Senjyuushi is required to read this.)

Wow, guess who managed to finish a fic for POTO Paris Commune week last-minute... I'm a little too drained to emote properly but, if anyone likes the Persian going through farcial emotional whiplash and Darius-as-narrator, or the Vaguely Creepy Twins trope, this is for you.

Also, Mme. Giry (???) makes a cameo.

To those who read it, thank you, thank you, thank you.

[fdelopera]

Leroux originally wrote Erik as being from Scandinavia in his manuscript, from the same region of Sweden as Christine, hence Erik's Swedish name. Then Leroux changed Erik's background to French, from Rouen - which is where Leroux was born. Leroux was doing a self-insert here. But he did not describe Erik or his family as being black.

It's important not to give Gaston Leroux credit that he doesn't deserve.

We can and should do "Death of the Author," which I'll discuss below, but it's also important not to give a white author credit for writing a non-white character when they haven't done so. This takes away from actual non-white characters in literature, especially non-white characters written by non-white authors.

It would have been powerful if Leroux had written Erik as being black. But he didn't. Not in his character description, nor in his background.

I say this from an intimate knowledge of Leroux's novel. I've studied Leroux's French manuscript, his 1909 Gaulois feuilleton serialization, and the original 1910 French novel. I'm a Leroux scholar and translator.

If we claim that Leroux did write Erik as being black, we are giving Leroux a modern recognition of progressiveness that he didn't earn, and doesn't deserve.

It was absolutely not progressive for Leroux to describe Erik as being like Othello when he sang the opera with Christine as Desdemona, for instance. Or for him to write Erik as being like Don Juan in Erik's self-insert opera, Don Juan triomphant.

Erik does spend his youth traveling with Romani people, but Leroux makes it clear that Erik is not Roma. They don't adopt him into their family. Instead, he exhibits himself in their traveling fair as the "mort vivant" in order to earn a living, and he also develops a magic act that he performs. He ran away with this Romani group to escape his abusive mother.

Leroux's description of Romani people is filled with a lot of the bigotry that you'd expect from an early 20th century French author (though 1990s British author Susan Kay in her novel "Phantom" said "hold my beer" and managed to write Romani characters with 100 times more racism and bigotry than Leroux did).

As for Othello, white actors in the 1800s performed Othello in black face (they of course also did this well into the late-1990s and early 2000s). That's partly what Leroux was describing through Christine's narration in "Apollo's Lyre," because Erik was wearing his black silk mask when he sang the opera with her.

Christine was also saying that Erik's black silk mask reminded her of Othello's complexion. She says, "Le masque noir d'Erik me faisait songer au masque naturel du More de Venise" -- "Erik's black mask reminded me of the natural mask of the Moor of Venice." But she wasn't saying that Erik shared Othello's complexion. Christine described Erik's complexion as being white and extremely pale, like the color of bone. The Daroga also describes Erik as being exceedingly pale. In his narration, he says, "Ayant enlevé son chapeau, il montra un front d'une pâleur de cire" -- "Having removed his hat, he revealed a forehead as pale as wax."

Leroux is using racist tropes here. He's describing Erik's "otherness" as being associated with black literary characters that were largely performed by white actors, and he's also making an allusion to blackface.

However, Leroux wasn't being literal. Instead, he was using literary "blackness" as a metaphor for "otherness," which nowadays we recognize as extremely racist, but in Leroux's day it was still used as a literary trope.

There are many progressive aspects of Leroux's novel. But we shouldn't give him credit for portraying a non-white main character in his novel when he didn't.

Instead, it's important to highlight intentionally written non-white characters in literature, especially when they are created by non-white authors.

.

Now, all that said, it's also vital to recognize "Death of the Author" here.

We should not give Leroux more credit than he deserves.

And at the same time, non-white actors should of course have the opportunity to play Erik as a non-white character on stage.

And Erik can and should be imagined however phans want to imagine him.

This gets into a discussion of canon versus fanon.

Non-white actors who bring their own experiences of being othered in white society have an experience of ostracization when portraying Erik that white actors won't have.

And non-white phans who see themselves in Erik and connect to him through a shared sense of "otherness" can and often do find tremendous power in that connection.

And I wish more non-white phanartists and phanfic writers would create more portrayals of Erik from their own lived experience. Mostly, he's portrayed as being white, according to Gerard Butler's performance in the 2004 movie, Michael Crawford's characterization from ALW's POTO, Susan Kay's characterization in "Phantom," or Leroux's description in his original novel.

There are also many productions of Phantom around the world where the cast is non-white, such as the recent production of ALW's POTO in Uganda, ALW's POTO in Shanghai, China, and the Takarazuka production of Kopit/Yeston's "Phantom" in Japan. And of course, there's Studio Life's theatrical production of Susan Kay's "Phantom" in Japan.

But also, we shouldn't give Gaston Leroux credit for this. He didn't earn it and he doesn't deserve it. He created an immensely compelling character in Erik who has stood the test of time, but he shouldn't be credited with making Erik non-white. That credit should go to the actors and to the phans.

Watched the 2004 Phantom of the Opera film for the first time ever, ask me anything

[thephantomessoftheopera]

Notes on Gaston Leroux‘s „The Phantom of the Opera“ - Chapter 27: „End of the Ghost‘s Love Story“

Artwork by @flaviamarquesart

<< Previous chapter

“End of the Ghost’s Love Story” is the most powerful chapter in the novel, because it reveals the full extent of Erik’s love for Christine. It is also the one that makes the story truly extraordinary, because it redeems his character and lifts him above the level of a gothic villain, who is usually defeated and punished in the end. This is why he is generally considered a “Byronic Hero” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byronic_hero). The Byronic hero is a complex, often tragic form of romantic anti-hero who is generally more villain than traditional hero, but who has at least one redeeming quality (usually connected to love) which makes him a sympathetic figure despite his flaws and/or crimes. The character type was created by the English poet Lord Byron in his works such as “The Corsair” and “Don Juan”, and became extremely popular in the 19th century. Except for his looks, Erik fits that classic character type in almost all other aspects (highly intelligent, tortured, violent, ruthless, manipulative and driven by an all-consuming passion).

The chapter’s title also makes it clear that the whole thing is a love story at its core - everything in the novel happened because Erik fell in love with Christine. It is, and has always been, the story of Erik’s love - he is the one character we follow up until the end.

The final chapter is narrated by Leroux again, but it draws on what the Persian supposedly told him when he went to visit him in his flat in the rue de Rivoli. When the Persian wakes up after losing consciousness in the water, he and Raoul are resting in the Louis-Philippe room, and Erik and Christine are taking care of them. Raoul has already woken up before the Persian, and is now asleep again.

The room itself astounds the Persian in how ordinary and old-fashioned it looks, and how much it contrasts with Erik’s general appearance (remember that the Persian had never been in Erik’s house before). Erik explains to him that the furniture once belonged to his mother, which explains why the style is so different from his bedroom, which is decidedly more „Erik“. The Persian also wonders why Christine, who is moving silently through the room and then sitting down beside the fireplace, ignores both Raoul and himself when tries to call her. The Persian believes that Christine is reading “The Imitation of Christ”, which is significant and which I will come back to a little later. The “opposites” theme is also present in this scene again, describing Erik’s figure as black and a demon, and Christine’s as white and an angel. The Persian finally falls asleep again.

When he wakes for the second time, Erik has already delivered him back to his flat according to the promise he made to “his wife”. The Persian immediately sends to find out what happened to Raoul, and learns that Raoul has disappeared and that Philippe’s body has been found on the shore of the lake under the opera house. The Persian has no doubt that Philippe was drowned by Erik (or “the siren”), and decides to denounce him to the police. However, his testimony is ridiculed, and he - like Raoul - is taken for a lunatic. The Persian then decides to write everything down and later hands his manuscript to Leroux (which is what we’ve been reading in these last chapters).

When he has finished writing his account down, Erik comes to visit him. He is clearly unwell and described as weak, leaning against the wall and “pale as a sheet”. The Persian accuses him of murdering Philippe and wants to know what happened to Raoul and Christine, whether they are dead or alive. Erik denies murdering Philippe, but the Persian doesn’t believe him. We don’t really know the truth though, so the “murder mystery” has no definite resolution and turns into more of a side note.

Erik tells the Persian that he is about to “die of love” for Christine. As I’ve mentioned before, I believe that the most likely physical cause of his death would really be the gunshot that Raoul fired at him, and a possible infection following that injury which would lead to his precarious state of health as seen in this chapter. This could metaphorically also be described as “dying of love” (because he wouldn’t have caught that bullet if he hadn’t been in love).

After turning the scorpion, Christine begged him to save Raoul, and she had already offered before to accept his proposal if he gave her the key to the torture chamber, but Erik did not care then, because he did not believe her. But when she swears to him that she will become his “living wife”, it‘s different as he finally sees in her eyes what he has been hoping to see - Christine’s genuine commitment. She means to go through with her promise and is accepting him as her husband at that moment - and this is why her commitment is powerful enough to break through to him.

According to their agreement, Erik takes the Persian aboveground, but since Raoul probably wouldn’t agree to leave, Erik drugs him and locks him up in the dungeon beneath the fifth cellar. Then he returns to Christine, who stands calmly waiting for him. Erik suddenly feels “shyer than a little child” as he approaches Christine, but she does not back away from him. He tenderly kisses her forehead and is overwhelmed with how good it feels to kiss her, as no woman has ever allowed him to, not even his mother. Christine even leans into his touch a little, and remains close to him after the kiss, „as if it were perfectly natural“.

Fear and disgust are very powerful, primal emotions, but Christine‘s feelings for Erik are strong enough to overcome both. Considering that no one, not even the Persian, was able to even look at Erik’s face without horror, I feel that Christine must have cared very deeply for him, as she allows his kiss without fear and without recoiling from him at all, even after everything he has put her through.

He falls at her feet and starts crying of happiness, and seeing his tears, Christine starts to cry as well. Erik tears off his mask so that he won’t lose any of her tears on his skin, and still Christine shows no sign of horror or disgust. And she doesn’t only allow him to touch her, but she also touches him of her own free will and takes his hand, saying “poor, unhappy Erik”. I feel that this is the moment when the full expanse of his life’s tragedy truly hits her. She is not only the first woman, but the first person in his entire life to treat him with tenderness and acceptance.

Gratitude and love for her overwhelm him and make him realize that he has forced her choice. He puts the gold wedding ring into her hand, setting her free and telling her that he knows she loves Raoul and that she is free to go and marry him whenever she pleases. He „calmly cuts his heart to pieces“ and puts her happiness before his own in this final expression of true love and sacrifice. For as damaged as he was, the ending proves that Erik truly loved Christine because his love is ultimately selfless. There is also no bitterness in his feelings towards Christine after she leaves - he has always loved her, and still continues to love her. He still feels protective of her: “I’d better not hear that anyone has touched a single hair on her head!” Christine gave him “all the happiness in the world”, and he is grateful to her for this gift. His love for her redeems him as a character and proves to be his moral compass - before, he considered himself “outside the human race” and therefore not bound by common moral values.

In the previous chapter, Christine is shown reading what the Persian believes to be “The Imitation of Christ”. I don’t think that is a coincidence, and I also believe that the name “Christine” was perhaps even chosen for her on purpose (she was originally named Pauline, according to Leroux’s manuscript). Christine becomes a “Christ figure” here in two ways: through her sacrifice, she saves the lives of Raoul, the Persian and everyone in the Opera. But she also offers acceptance and love to a sinner, an outcast who has been shunned by society - and this is an extremely powerful gesture. She possessed the strength necessary to see Erik as a human being, and that is what sets her apart from everyone else. Her love here transcends the realm of romantic love and becomes almost divine - all-encompassing, forgiving, healing.

Christine may superficially fit the traditional image of a “damsel in distress”, but the would-be hero who was coming to rescue her didn’t get very far, nor could he do anything to save her. The only hero who saved Christine was Christine herself - and she also saved everyone else: Raoul, the Persian, everyone in the Opera, and Erik. Both Christine and Erik show incredible bravery in this chapter: Christine‘s bravery shows in her truly accepting Erik as a man and in saving Raoul, and Erik‘s bravery consists in letting her go, relinquishing his one chance in his life of having everything he has ever dreamed of.

Erik then goes to free Raoul and brings him to Christine, where Raoul and Christine kiss. Christine swears to Erik that she will come back to bury him with the ring, and then she finally kisses him before they leave.

Seeing Erik weeping and overcome with emotion, the Persian no longer doubts him. Erik tells the Persian that when he feels he is close to dying, he will send the letters that Christine had left with him and a few of her personal objects to him, and that this would be the cue for the Persian to put an obituary notice in the newspaper so that Christine and Raoul would know. Interestingly, that entire arrangement hinged on Erik himself announcing his death without anyone confirming it, because he could only mail things to the Persian if he was still alive. This leaves a lot of blank space for the reader’s imagination, because who knows if he really died…? The Persian, at least, never saw him again, but announced three weeks later that “Erik is dead”.

Next chapter >>

[maxwell-grant]

other than Godzilla, Mothra, and the creatures from Lovecraft, are there any iconic monsters and beasties from the pulps?

I do want to give a more thorough answer someday since monsters are much more of an area of interest of mine than pulps are, but for the time being, I'll name 10.

1: The Thing

A monster so iconic that most are not aware it was actually originated in a pulp story, titled "Who Goes There?", first published in Astounding Science Fiction before becoming a novel, then a movie, and then the John Carpenter remake. The Thing's popularity really speaks for itself. I could probably include other John Carpenter monsters here since I've talked before on how much of pulps came through in his films, but I'll leave it to just The Thing as it.

2: Bug-Eyed Monsters

Not so much a specific monster as a general category of pulp sci-fi monsters, usually predatory in nature, grotesquely oversized and described as bug-eyed, which were prevalent enough not just to become a stock archetype that's seen very popular usage outside of pulps, like Invader Zim, but to even be the name of horror anthology magazines

3: The Giant Woman

The almost literal poster girl for 50s pulp sci-fi/horror and all the hokeyness and parody that's usually afforded them nowadays, it's hard to think of the giant woman trope played straight for horror instead of a parody of the idea, or just as a fetish thing, and it's hard to think of them as much of a monster in the first place. Still, it's undeniably iconic, and it's a category of monster in it's own right, if only because of the sheer popularity of the poster for Attack of the 50 Foot Woman.

4: Brain in a Jar

Another type of monster generally associated with 50s sci-fi, the Brain in a Jar actually did come to life primarily on pulp magazines, enough times for it to practically constitute a character type in it's own right, showing up in stories written by Olaf Stapledon, Lovecraft, Gustave le Rouge and Otto Binder, and the rogues galleries of characters like Captain Future and Tom Shark, even being the protagonists of a couple of stories, usually as villains or tragic victims wanting to die.

5: Dinosaurs

Yup, dinosaurs as monsters is something that took off in the pulps, not surprisingly. While dinosaurs had been discovered as early as 1812-1820, it wasn't until the very late 1890s and the early 1910s that dinosaurs began taking off as great monsters of fiction, in works like Beyond the Great South Wall in 1901 which marks the first explicitly villainous dinosaur, Panic in Paris in 1910 which seems to be first on the works of fiction to feature scenes of dinosaurs rampaging through streets, and A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder from 1888 which is a "lost world" story that predates Doyle's by over two decades, and might have been considered the progenitor of the fantasy novel had it not debuted a year after H.Rider Haggard's She and King Solomon's Mines.

6: The Phantom of the Opera

I'm gonna avoid including human villains, but The Phantom's essentially become a sub-category of monster in it's own right, and he's definitely iconic enough to merit inclusion. My reasoning for him being grouped alongside pulp characters is because the original story by Gaston Leroux was actually published in serialized format as a feuilleton in newspaper Le Galouis, and as I've established before, feuilletons were France's pulp fiction, one of the very earliest examples of pulp even before the Americans got on it. It's hardly that surprising that Erik would be grouped among the villains and monsters of pulp fiction, considering the similarities between him and a certain shadowy avenger with a similar flair for theatrics.

7: Killer Robots/Cyborgs

Kind of self-explanatory, as they were practically the bread and butter of most sci-fi pulps pending towards horror. Although mentions of automata date from before the pulps, it was in their time that this rose to such pop culture prominence. The Nick Carter novels had what is considered the first cyborg in fiction. The term "robot" was coined by Karel Čapek, who became a pulp magazine writer. Robots and aliens were among the premier monsters of most pulp sci-fi stories, even if not necessarily their main villains usually. And speaking of aliens,

8: UFOs

While they predate pulps, the general idea of aliens as stock pop culture monsters first took life in pulp magazines. Murray Leinster’s First Contact, while it's aliens are not evil, coined the term "first contact" and provided a template for every story based around the idea ever since. The Martian Chronicles by Rad Bradbury is often credited by sci-fi historians as a pivotal event in the genre’s growing respectability and mainstream success. More famously, you had writers like Robert Heinlein, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Olaf Stapledon and Francis Flagg all striking several different speculations regarding aliens, a variety that ultimately ensured the alien's popularity as a new monster archetype.

9: The Headless Mule

Included here because I make it a point to reference one figure from Brazil's history, as cordel literature is our local equivalent to pulp, and the Headless Mule is one of the most famous monsters of our folklore and one of the most prominent stories across cordel. As cordel tends to revolve around folk poems, songs, tales and novels, monsters from Brazilian folklore tend to show up in those, and I intend on writing more extensively about them soon. The Headless Mule is one of the most popular and I'll paste a short description of her below:

The headless mule is, in fact, a woman, cursed after having sexual relations with a priest (regardless of whether or not she consents), who suffers a similar fate to the werewolf. On nights from Thursday to Friday, she turns into a dark-haired mule, with either a head shrouded in flames, or a perpetual flame for a skull.

She goes out riding quickly through villages, seven, to be exact, causing damage wherever she goes by either running over people and trampling and tearing them with sharp hooves, or burning any who approaches it's fire.

There is one way to free the woman from the curse: It carries a glowing iron curb in its mouth. If someone is brave enough to pull it out, the mule will transform back into a woman, never to change again.

10: King Kong

Proof of how irrevelant it is whether or not a pulp character was ever part of a pulp magazine. While Kong didn't start out in pulp magazines, nor was he published in one like Godzilla as far as I can recall, it's pretty indisputable that Kong and Skull Island have been extremely influential in much of pop culture's perception of pulp jungle adventures and giant monsters, influencing the creation of Godzilla and Mothra and the kaiju genre. Kong and Skull Island have had so, so many crossovers with pulp heroes that I'd be incredibly remiss not to include him, and so he's here as my final inclusion.

[glassprism]

Original Erik is written to resemble that of a living corpse, skeleton-like. How then is he strong enough to carry Christine?

I usually repeat the MST3K Mantra to myself: "It's just a show book, I should really just relax."

Meaning that, for me, it's a pretty minor detail that I don't need explained because it doesn't ruin my enjoyment of the story. Some of this is also just knowing that The Phantom of the Opera was, originally, a serialized novel, a pretty short one at that, and one of many that Leroux penned, and not that he didn't work hard at it or anything, but Erik basically does what is required for Plot To Happen, and so long as it isn't incredibly unrealistic, I'm willing to roll with it. Whatever is the cause of Erik's appearance, it is, again, what is needed for Plot; it's not scrupulously scientifically based and it doesn't need to be, because this isn't that type of book.

And if you think about it, there are other things that might not make sense with Erik's condition, such as his ability to swing around the rafters so much, or climbing the Apollo's Lyre statue, or working on his Don Juan Triumphant manuscript without eating or sleeping for days at a time. Carrying Christine is just one of those. But again, all those things happen because they are needed for the story or add to the character, so I just accept it.

But if you really want a possible explanation, you can say that maybe Erik has a very special condition that causes him to look like a skeleton but have the strength of an above-average man. Or just tell yourself that Leroux's novel is written in part like an investigative report, with interviews and recollections from important characters at the event who are also up to thirty years removed from it. So perhaps their memories are unreliable.; perhaps they are exaggerating; and perhaps Leroux added this in to make it more realistically "investigative". If you really think about it, most everything in the novel can be questioned or thought of as ambiguous... This means you can play around a lot with the characters' interpretations and actions, and also allows you to handwave details that don't "make sense" to you.

So whatever works for you.

[your-angle-of-music]

Of all the classic operatic figures that Erik could have picked to focus on in his magnum opus, the ultimate expression of his trauma and agony, the work that he intends to kill him and die with him, why the hell did he go with Don Juan? And why Don Juan Triumphant? (We are steadfastly ignoring the ALW musical version here.)

In most versions of the story (including in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, the most famous version and the one that Erik references to Christine), Don Juan is a wealthy nobleman who likes to drink, gamble, and most of all seduce young women in scenarios where consent is often dubious, if not nonexistent. He frequently adopts various disguises or elaborate schemes to get into their petticoats, and he never stays for long. One day, Don Juan is caught in the act by the father of his latest lover. Don Juan kills the father (Don Gonzalo) without hesitation or remorse. A little later, high on his hubris, Don Juan finds Don Gonzalo’s statue in a graveyard and mockingly invites him to dinner. Except, Don Gonzalo actually comes to dinner, and demands that Don Juan repent. Don Juan refuses, and he gets dragged down to hell.

There are some superficial similarities between Don Juan as we know him and Erik. The trickster aspect comes to mind; Erik is also a master of disguise and voice tricks and clever schemes to act unseen or unrecognized. I do think that that’s important.

But I mean, besides that…what else is there? Erik and Don Juan both have villainous qualities, but they are expressed very differently. Erik is lonely; Don Juan is horny. Erik is disgusted by himself; Don Juan doesn’t give a fuck. Erik is reflective; Don Juan is impulsive. Erik loves possessively; Don Juan is incapable of love. Erik seeks control; Don Juan seeks mindlessness.

And most of all, Erik, unlike Don Juan, is an outsider. Don Juan is handsome and charming and rich. He can make anyone fall in love with him at first sight, if only for one night. He has the power to hurt women of all classes without retribution because he is a nobleman and therefore untouchable. He’s smart, to be sure, but even more than that, he’s lucky. The only thing that can hurt him is the wrath of God himself; humans can’t get in his way.

Erik has none of those advantages. He is the lowest of the low, who cannot hurt with impunity (unless it’s for someone else’s ends, like the Shah’s, and even then, it’s borrowed time, or unless he becomes very good at hiding). And so it’s not some heavenly force that eventually “defeats” him, but real and human compassion — something that he, unlike Don Juan, is rarely shown.

In the David Coward translation of the novel, the most full one I have access to, Erik describes his Don Juan Triumphant like this: “My Don Juan does not use a Lorenzo Da Ponte libretto, nor is it marred by drink, carnal love and vice in order to show them ultimately punished by God,” rather, “my Don is never licked by the flames of heavenly wrath, yet he burns, Christine, he burns!”

I really wish I understood French, because I cannot tell whether Leroux means that Erik’s Don Juan never does the sex-drugs-and-rock-n-roll thing at all, or whether he does, and it goes unpunished by the powers that be. I’m leaning towards the latter. This Don Juan sounds very interesting. He also sounds very little like Erik. 

In his footnote, Coward states that a Don Juan who never goes to hell is “a bold assertion of human will.” I see where he’s coming from, but I think he’s only half right. Listen to Christine’s description of the actual musical composition (sorry for the very long quotation): 

“His Don Juan Triumphant sounded to me like a long, wrenching, magnificent cry of distress into which Erik had poured all his doomed unhappiness. I recalled the manuscript book filled with red notes and could easily imagine that such music had been written in blood. It took my on a journey through his suffering, into every corner of the abyss inhabited by the man with the devastated face; it showed me Erik banging his poor hideous head against the shadowy walls of his own hell, avidly fleeing the gaze of human beings to avoid filling them with horror. Stunned, breathless, abject, beaten, I listened to that explosion of gigantic chords which made suffering divine. Then unexpectedly the notes rising up out of the abyss gathered themselves into one single, monumental menacing flight, into a turning, gyring swarm that took off into the heavens as the eagle soars towards the sun, and a triumphant concatenation of sounds seemed to set the world on fire. At that moment, I knew that the work was finished and that Ugliness raised on the wings of Love had at last dared to look Beauty in the face!”

Is it just me or does this not sound very Don Juan, or very triumphant? It’s just…pain. Lots of pain. It ends on a note of hope with Erik falling in love, but he only gets to look. Not touch or have or experience. If someone is triumphing, it’s not Erik. If there is a Don Juan, it’s something else, his cage, his complement, his opposite, his oppressor. Something that never ends up getting punished, at least not by the universe as we know it.

I think this opera has Erik as its protagonist, but it is named for its villain. Don Juan is Raoul, or Philippe, or the opera managers, or the Shah and the little sultana, or the Sultan, or his parents. People who had opportunities that he never did and who use them to hurt people like him whom they can get away with hurting. Like Don Juan, they change shape through the years, but they’re still all the same. Erik lives in a world where the Don Juans always triumph, and it seems as though God himself is on their side. 

So maybe Don Juan Triumphant is a bold assertion of human will, but not because Erik is evading hell, but because Erik believes that God hates him, and that he doesn’t deserve his hatred. He lays bare hell for all to see, and states that the wrong man has been put inside it. He condemns his society through the language of music and theater that he has always known, and inserts real human suffering into operatic artifice. And the work will die with him, because the world isn’t ready for the product of his pain.

I have many, many problems with Erik and his self-perception. But if I’m right about this… well. I think that’s pretty sexy of him indeed.

[the-literata-letters]

reading list - gothic

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS MY OTHER READING LISTS.

✵ ACTIVELY UPDATING ✵

☐  ALDERMAN, Naomi – The Lessons ☐  ATWOOD, Margaret – Lady Oracle ☐  AUSTEN, Jane – Northanger Abbey ☐  AZEVEDO, Álvares de – Noite na Taverna ☐  BECKFORD, William Thomas – Vathek ☐  BIERCE, Ambrose – The Death of Halpin Frayser ☐  BIERCE, Ambrose – The Spook House ☐  BLACKWELL, Anastasia – The House on Black Lake ☐  BLACKWOOD, Algernon – The Listener and Other Stories ☐  BRONTË, Charlotte – Jane Eyre ☐  BRONTË, Charlotte – Villette ☐  BRONTË, Emily – Wuthering Heights ☐  BROWN, Charles Brockden – Wieland ☐  BROWN, Charles Brockden – Ormond ☐  CAPOTE, Truman – Other Voices, Other Rooms ☐  CARTER, Angela – The Bloody Chamber ☐  CATHER, Willa – My Ántonia ☐  CAZOTTE, Jacques – Le Diable amoureux ☐  CHAMBERS, Robert W. – The King in Yellow ☐  DANFORTH, Emily M. – Plain Bad Heroines ☐  DANIELEWSKI, Mark Z. – House of Leaves ☐  DICKENS, Charles – Oliver Twist ☐  DICKENS, Charles – Bleak House ☐  DICKENS, Charles – Great Expectations ☐  DICKENS, Charles – The Mystery of Edwin Drood ☐  DOSTOYEVSKY, Fyodor Mikhailovich – The Double ☐  DOSTOYEVSKY, Fyodor Mikhailovich – The Landlady ☐  DOSTOYEVSKY, Fyodor Mikhailovich – Bobok ☐  DOSTOYEVSKY, Fyodor Mikhailovich – The Brothers Karamazov ☐  DOYLE, Sir Arthur Conan – Lot No. 249 ☐  du MAURIER, Daphne – Jamaica Inn ☐  du MAURIER, Daphne – Rebecca ☐  du MAURIER, Daphne – My Cousin Rachel ☐  du MAURIER, George – Trilby ☐  FARING, Sara – The Tenth Girl ☐  FARRELL, Henry – What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? ☐  FAULKNER, William – The Sound and the Fury ☐  FAULKNER, William – As I Lay Dying ☐  FAULKNER, William – Light in August ☐  FAULKNER, William – Absalom, Absalom! ☐  FLAMMENBERG, Ludwig – The Necromancer ☐  GARSHIN, Vsevolod Mikhailovich – The Red Flower ☐  GAUTIER, Theophile – The Mummy's Foot ☐  GILMAN, Charlotte Perkins – The Yellow Wallpaper ☐  GOGOL, Nikolai Vasilievich – Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka ☐  GOGOL, Nikolai Vasilievich – Mirgorod ☐  GOGOL, Nikolai Vasilievich – Arabesques ☐  GOGOL, Nikolai Vasilievich – The Nose ☐  GRACQ, Julien – Au château d'Argol ☐  HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel – Young Goodman Brown ☐  HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel – The Minister's Black Veil ☐  HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel – Edward Randolph's Portrait ☐  HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel – The House of the Seven Gables ☐  HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel – Rappacini's Daughter ☐  HILL, Susan – The Woman in Black ☐  HOFFMANN, E. T. A. – The Devil's Exilir ☐  HOFFMANN, E. T. A. – The Entail ☐  HOFFMANN, E. T. A. – Gambler's Luck ☐  HOGG, James – The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner ☐  HOLT, Victoria – Mistress of Mellyn ☐  HOLT, Victoria – Kirkland Revels ☐  HUGO, Victor – Notre-Dame de Paris ☐  HUYSMANS, Joris-Karl – Là-bas ☐  INGOLDSBY, Thomas – The Ingoldsby Legends ☐  IRVING, Washington – The Adventure of the German Student ☐  IRVING, Washington – "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" ☐  JACKSON, Shirley – The Lottery ☐  JACKSON, Shirley – A Visit ☐  JACKSON, Shirley – The Haunting of Hill House ☐  JACKSON, Shirley – We Have Always Lived in the Castle ☐  JACOBS, W. W. – The Monkey's Paw ☐  JAMES, Henry – The Turn of the Screw ☐  JELINEK, Elfriede – Die Kinder der Toten ☐  LATHOM, Francis – The Midnight Bell ☐  le FANU, SHERIDAN – Uncle Silas ☐  le FANU, SHERIDAN – In a Glass Darkly ☐  le FANU, SHERIDAN – Carmilla ☐  LEE, Harper – To Kill a Mockingbird ☐  LEIGH, Julia – The Hunger ☐  LEROUX, Gaston – Le Fantôme de l'Opéra ☐  LEVIN, Ira – The Stepford Wives ☐  LEWIS, Matthew Gregory – The Monk ☐  LEWIS, Matthew Gregory – The Castle Spectre ☐  MACHEN, Arthur – The Great God Pan ☐  MARRYAT, Florence – The Blood of the Vampire ☐  MARRYAT, Florence – The Phantom Ship ☐  MATURIN, Charles – Melmoth the Wanderer ☐  MEANEY, John – Bone Song ☐  MÉRIMÉE, PROSPER – La Vénus d'Ille ☐  MOORE, John – Zeluco ☐  MORRISON, Toni – Beloved ☐  NERVAL, Gérard de – Les Filles du feu ☐  OATES, Joyce Carol – Bellefleur ☐  OATES, Joyce Carol – Night-Side ☐  OATES, Joyce Carol – A Bloodsmoor Romance ☐  OATES, Joyce Carol – Mysteries of Winterthum ☐  OATES, Joyce Carol – My Heart Laid Bare ☐  O'CONNER, Flannery – Wise Blood ☐  ODOEVSKY, Vladimir – Russian Nights ☐  PARKER, Gilbert – The Lane that Had No Turning, and Other Tales ☐  PARSONS, Eliza – The Castle of Wolfenbach ☐  PARSONS, Eliza – The Mysterious Warning ☐  PEACOCK, Thomas Love – Nightmare Abbey ☐  PEAKE, Mervyn – Gormenghast ☐  PHILLIPS, Arthur – Angelica ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "Berenice" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "Ligeia" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Fall of the House of Usher" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Masque of the Read Death" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Oval Portrait" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Pit and the Pendulum" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Black Cat" ☐  POE, Edgar Allan – "The Tell-Tale Heart" ☐  POTOCKI, Jan – The Manuscript Found in Saragossa ☐  PUSHKIN, Alexander – The Bridegroom ☐  PUSHKIN, Alexander – The Undertaker ☐  PUSHKIN, Alexander – The Queen of Spades ☐  RADCLIFFE, Ann – A Sicilian Romance ☐  RADCLIFFE, Ann – The Romance of the Forest ☐  RADCLIFFE, Ann – The Mysteries of Udolpho ☐  RADCLIFFE, Ann – The Italian ☐  RAY, Jean – Malpertuis ☐  ROCHE, Regina Maria – Clermont ☐  ROCHE, Regina Maria – The Children of the Abbey ☐  ROSTOPCHINA, Yevdokia Petrovna – Poedinok ☐  SETTERFIELD, Diane – The Thirteenth Tale ☐  SHELLEY, Mary – Frankenstein ☐  SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe – Zastrozzi ☐  SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe – St. Irvyne; or, The Rosicrucian ☐  SLEATH, Eleanor – The Orphan of the Rhine ☐  STEVENSON, Robert Louis – Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde ☐  STEWART, Mary – Nine Coaches Waiting ☐  STOKER, Bram – Dracula ☐  STOKER, Bram – The Lair of the White Worm ☐  STORM, Theodor – Der Schimmelreiter ☐  TARTT, Donna – The Secret History ☐  TARTT, Donna – The Little Friend ☐  THOMAS, Elisabeth – Catherine House ☐  URBAN, Miloš – Sedmikostelí ☐  WALPOLE, Horace – The Castle of Otranto ☐  WILDE, Oscar – The Picture of Dorian Gray ☐  ZAFÓN, Carlos Ruiz – La sombra del viento

[guardmesherlock-rowan]

September Check-In

Headcanon Birthdays this Month!

Henry Jekyll - September 16th

Erik Leroux - September 23rd

Erik Leroux is an OC love interest, one that I thought would've worked well in the GMS universe.  He is from France and a very close friend to Jeremy Cassel.  Though Jeremy is a simple business man and Erik is a simple stage hand.  Though both he and Jeremy like to talk about the rumors of the composer known as Opera Ghost back home who submits his works to the company.  Seems a lot of strange things happen if they ignore the manuscript, or dangerous accidents if they try to get rid of it!  Otherwise Erik is a very talented singer, though he doesn't seem to want to be one stage, but he has taken an interest in MC after she had performed in a musical the year prior, even though in minor role.  He has other interests and talents too!  He's a fantastic magician and has extensive knowledge in stage make up.

I hope you all let me know how you like him!

I am still struggling to get a writing schedule down, especially since I changed jobs last month too since I made my last check in.  Which means my schedule is a little off, including when I sleep as I now have a second shift.  

With that I'm trying to plan ahead and write things in advance.  With how quick August flew by I have no doubt September will do the same!  So please take a look at my Halloween prompts (or submit your own if you have something in mind) and send them in so I can start working on them sooner than later!

As always I appreciate feedback and if you can please consider donating to my kofi.

Take care and Stay safe!

[devilswalkingstick]

Summary:

A missing manuscript from years past reveals the truth of what happened so long ago on Coney Island between Madame la Vicomtesse, Monsieur le Vicomte, and the mysterious Mr. Y, as recounted by them.

-

"The author" is their own character, as are family members mentioned. This is just a Love Never Dies rewrite. Just because I've rewatched it a hundred times doesn't mean I like it. I tried a Leroux style because he is a delight to read!!! And just as fun to write!!!

[dreaminginsteadofsleeping42]

Autobiography, book-bosomed, and epilogue for the book ask! 💕💕

Hi Katie!!

Epilogue: What is a book that made you cry? Not many books have made me cry. I can think of just four off the top of my head: The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux, The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, and All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Every time it was the ending that did it for me. Oh. And Charlotte’s Web, lol. Cried like a BABY. Manuscript: What is a book you want to read but are intimidated by? Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. I’ve had it sitting in my bookshelf for years, but it is HUGE. I’ve read HUGE (it’s a specific qualification) books before, like War and Peace, but do I have the strength to do it again? I’ve heard scary things such as multi-page descriptions of the Paris sewer system about Les Mis. But my dad read it and liked it so I really want to read it…eventually. Book-bosomed: what is a book you feel everyone should read? Jane Eyre. Anything by Kate Morton. Or Jane Austen.

[fdelopera]

Hi, I recently found your blog and all of your very informative posts on the translations etc.

I have a few questions I hope you might be able to answer.

First of all, I've been told that Christine’s birthday is October 11th and that this is from Leroux's Canon. I can't find any indication of that in any of the translations I've read, and I'm wondering if it was in the serial and Leroux cut it for the novelization?

I've also been told that in the serial, Christine makes a handkerchief embroidered with F. de le O. for Erik, and that it was cut from the novel.

Do either of these have any credence?

Hi there! Thanks for your question. Neither of these are true to Leroux's canon.

Leroux never mentions Christine's birthday in any version of Phantom (not the standard 1st edition text, the Gaulois serialization, or his surviving manuscript), though we can infer from the text that she is around 20 or 21 when the main events of the story take place.

In the Gaulois serialization, Erik does have a monogrammed handkerchief, embroidered with his initials "F. O.", but these are handkerchiefs that he had monogrammed himself. Christine didn't give them to him.

Here is the passage in question, from the Gaulois serialization of the deleted chapter, L'Enveloppe magic (The Magic Envelope). In it, we also learn that Erik is a Dracula fanboy, and is currently reading a serialized vampire novel called "La Fille du Vampire" ("The Vampire's Daughter").

Here is my rendering of this passage, from my translation of "The Magic Envelope":

Meanwhile, Mercier in turn took the liberty of opening the basket and found that it contained nothing more than a handkerchief of the finest lace monogrammed with the interwoven letters, “P.O.,” a bunch of keys, a box of matches, twelve sous, and an old edition of the Petit Journal, folded to the section of the serialized novel: The Vampire’s Daughter.

[andrewlloydwebber]

Just finished watching LND! The Australian version is definitely better than the London and it’s definitely better to watch than listen to, but holy mess...I didn’t need Masquerade extended to musical-length. Also, I don’t care about whatever toxic threesome the trio have going on, I want a sequel (or a prequel) all about my queen, Carlotta 👸🏻

Lmao saying the Australian version is better than the London version is comparing being stabbed with two different knives. But I agree, it seems to be more "nuanced" like if nuance was a scale of 1-100 and LND London was a -2 and LND Australia was a 1.

I do think that in some people's eyes the sets and costumes absolve some of the sins. Honestly while the London costumes were well made and designed for the most part (except the Phantom's puffy shirt), they were not ornate enough to measure up to Phantom and to act as "set pieces in their own right". The sets were kind of trying to have the black box feel, but also in some scenes were way too busy. The Australian production is really beautiful, I just don't admit it often because I'm bitter.

Lol Carlotta really does need a sequel! I think the trio's stories are wrapped up nicely after Phantom. I believe in the original manuscript of Leroux's novel (but not in the commonly published version) she actually does tour America as a singer? This caused me (back when I thought LND could be saved if ALW was willing to change Gustave's parentage) to write the outline of an AU/rewrite where Carlotta takes the place of Meg as the one working for the Phantom. Still better than LND (but most things are)

[bogglebabbles]

neglected manuscript and phantom footsteps!

Ah, thank you!

neglected manuscript - Do you have a favorite novel? 

Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux which probably surprises nobody pfff. I try to name off other favourites, but the roster tends to change depending on what, exactly, I’m reading at the time. (I just get so excited to be reading something that nine times out of ten, I fall in love with it.)

phantom footsteps - Do you believe in ghosts?

I have a complicated relationship with the supernatural in that I am an absolute skeptic, but 1. I would still pee myself in terror if I went into somewhere that’s meant to be haunted and something happened, and 2. weird stuff has happened to me that I can’t really explain away no matter how hard I try. I don’t necessarily think those things are ghosts because I don’t like that being my first go-to when I can’t explain something, but I can’t really deny that it was weird.

So I suppose in short, the jury’s still out on spooks haha.

Thank you so much for the questions, Charlotte!

[confessionsofanoperaghost]

I have never visited him in his sumptuous quarters five levels below the Opera, across the dark lake. But he has described them. Rich divans, exquisitely carved tables, amazing silk and satin draperies. The large, superbly embellished mantelpiece, on which rest two curious boxes, one containing the figure of a grasshopper, the other the figure of a scorpion... He can, in discoursing upon his domestic arrangements, become almost merry. For example, speaking of the wine he has stolen from the private cellar of the Opera's Board of Directors: "A very adequate Montrachet! Four bottles! Each director accusing every other director! I tell you, it made me feel like a director myself! As if I were worth two or three millions and had a fat, ugly wife! And the trout was admirable. You know what the Poles say---fish, to taste right, must swim three times: in water, butter, and wine. All in all, a splendid evening!" But he immediately alters the mood by making some gloomy observation. "Our behavior is mocked by the behavior of dogs." It is not often that the accents of joy issue from beneath that mask. Monday. I am standing at the place I sometimes encounter him, a little door at the rear of the Opera (the building has 2, 531 doors to which there are 7, 593 keys). He always appears "suddenly"---a coup de theatre that is, to tell the truth, more annoying than anything else. We enact a little comedy of surprise. "It' s you!" "Yes. " "What are you doing here?" "Waiting. " But today no one appears, although I wait for half an hour. I have wasted my time. Except--- Faintly, through many layers of stone, I hear organ music. The music is attenuated but unmistakable. It is his great work Don Juan Triumphant. A communication of a kind. I rejoice in his immense, buried talent. But I know that he is not happy. His situation is simple and terrible. He must decide whether to risk life aboveground or to remain forever in hiding, in the cellars of the Opera. His tentative, testing explorations in the city (always at night) have not persuaded him to one course or the other. Too, the city is no longer the city he knew as a young man. Its meaning has changed. At a cafe table, in a place where the light from the streetlamps is broken by a large tree, we sit silently over our drinks. Everything that can be said has been said many times. I have no new observations to make. The decision he faces has been tormenting him for decades. "If after all I---" But he cannot finish the sentence. We both know what is meant. I am distracted, a bit angry. How many nights have I spent this way, waiting upon his sighs? In the early years of our friendship I proposed vigorous measures. A new life! Advances in surgery, I told him, had made a normal existence possible for him. New techniques in--- "I'm too old." One is never too old, I said. There were still many satisfactions open to him, not the least the possibility of service to others. His music! A home, even marriage and children were not out of the question. What was required was boldness, the will to break out of old patterns... Now as these thoughts flicker through our brains, he smiles ironically. Sometimes he speaks of Christine: "That voice! "But I was perhaps overdazzled by the circumstances... "A range from low C to the F above high C! "Flawed, of course... "Liszt heard her. 'Que, c'est beau!' he cried out. "Possibly somewhat deficient in temperament. But I had temperament enough for two." Such goodness! Such gentleness! "I would pull down the very doors of heaven for a---'' Tuesday. A few slashes of lightning in the sky... Is one man entitled to fix himself at the center of a cosmos of hatred, and remain there? The acid... The lost love... Yet all of this is generations cold. There have been wars, inventions, assassinations, discoveries... Perhaps practical affairs have assumed, in his mind, a towering importance. Does he fear the loss of the stipend (20,000 francs per month) that he has not ceased to extort from the directors of the Opera? But I have given him assurances. He shall want for nothing. Occasionally he is overtaken by what can only be called fits of grandiosity "One hundred million cells in the brain! All intent on being the Phantom of the Opera!" "Between three and four thousand human languages! And I am the Phantom of the Opera in every one of them!" This is quickly followed by the deepest despair. He sinks into a chair, passes a hand over his mask. "Forty years of it!" Why must I have him for a friend? I wanted a friend with whom one could be seen abroad. With whom one could exchange country weekends, on our respective estates! I put these unworthy reflections behind me... Gaston Leroux was tired of writing The Phantom of the Opera. He replaced his pen in its penholder. "I can always work on The Phantom of the Opera later---in the fall, perhaps. Right now I feel like writing The Secret of the Yellow Room." Gaston Leroux took the manuscript of The Phantom of the Opera and put it on a shelf in the closet. Then, seating himself once more at his desk, he drew toward him a clean sheet of foolscap. At the top he wrote the words The Secret of the Yellow Room. Wednesday. I receive a note urgently requesting a meeting. "All men that are ruined are ruined on the side of their natural propensities," the note concludes. This is surely true. Yet the vivacity with which he embraces ruin is unexampled, in my experience. When we meet he is pacing nervously in an ill-lit corridor just off the room where the tympani are stored. I notice that his dress, always so immaculate, is disordered, slept-in-looking. A button hangs by a thread from his waistcoat. "I have brought you a newspaper," I say. "Thank you. I wanted to tell you...that I have made up my mind. " His hands are trembling. I hold my breath. "I have decided to take your advice. Sixty-five is not after all the end of one's life! I place myself in your hands. Make whatever arrangements you wish. Tomorrow night at this time I quit the Opera forever." Blind with emotion, I can think of nothing to say. A firm handclasp, and he is gone. A room is prepared. I tell my servants that I am anticipating a visitor who will be with us for an indefinite period. I choose for him a room with a splendid window, a view of the Seine; but I am careful also to have installed heavy velvet curtains, so that the light, with which the room is plentifully supplied, will not come as an assault. The degree of light he wishes. And when I am satisfied that the accommodations are all that could be desired, I set off to interview the doctor I have selected. "You understand that the operation, if he consents to it, will have specific...psychological consequences?" I nod. And he shows me in a book pictures of faces with terrible burns, before and after having been reconstructed by his science. It is indeed an album of magical transformations. "I would wish first to have him examined by my colleague Dr. W., a qualified alienist." "This is possible. But I remind you that he has had no intercourse with his fellow men, myself excepted, for---" "But was it not the case that originally, the violent emotions of revenge and jealousy---" "Yes. But replaced now, I believe, by a melancholy so deep, so all-pervading---" Dr. Mirabeau assumes a mock-sternness. "Melancholy, sir, is an ailment with which I have had some slight acquaintance. We shall see if his distemper can resist a little miracle. " And he extends, into the neutral space between us, a shining scalpel. But when I call for the Phantom on Thursday, at the appointed hour, he is not there. What vexation! Am I not slightly relieved? Can it be that he doesn't like me? I sit down on the kerb, outside the Opera. People passing look at me. I will wait here for a hundred years. Or until the hot meat of romance is cooled by the dull gravy of common sense once more. 

(text by Donald Barthelme, 1972, City Life, NYC)

[ofbeautsandbeasts]

14, 17, 30

14. Do you feel uncomfortable standing beneath a large chandelier?Lol, no. I’ll gladly stand under a large chandelier like an idiot.17. Have you ever written a phan phic?I’ve written a 200,000+ word phic, which is the manuscript for the manga I intend to produce soon. Outside of that, basically nothing.30. How does Erik look in your imagination? Quite Leroux-ish. Basically just as Buquet describes, but sometimes I imagine his hair more like Lon Chaney’s…And I imagine Erik does have lips. And his teeth look like David Bowie’s before he got them straightened. Anyway, here’s a drawing of mine to help you visualize: