Course Blog 8: Don Giovanni (Jennifer)

I'm sorry - I spaced on the fact that this was a full-class blog and just posted some quick thoughts on my private blog instead. I'll keep this short. I'm going to view the opera from the ideas of Auslander and Cavell, in an effort to explain what I thought was a "glamorously tragic" moment in the opera and why it worked.

 Auslander's consideration of the spectacle of glam rock is clearly relevant to the spectacle of Don Giovanni. As previous writers (Whitney, Kelly, et. al.) have mentioned,  "the set was obviously expensive, the costumes were lush, the special effects were insane" (Kelly). This recalls some of Auslander's descriptions of, for example, John's Children, who "dressed in dazzling white outfits, bounced hyperactively around the stage, became famous for destroying their instruments and equipment, but assaulted each other and ran through the audience" (47).  These performances are intended to amaze and, by amazing, engage the audience. Therefore, it is sensible that a scene's transporting power can be (although there are, of course, other methods) directly proportional to its spectacularity: the most characters, greatest plot tension, most beautiful scenery, most extravagant music, and liveliest action will lead to the greatest transport. (Simplistic, I know, but Auslander cares a great deal about excess.)

Let me give a precise example of the moment I believe meets these qualifications and underlines Auslander's point. During Scene 3 of the first act, the entire cast is on stage during the ballroom scene. There is a veritable orgy on stage among the peasants, the three maskers are dancing mechanically in a corner, and the tension between all of them is clear. Only Don Giovanni seems not to care about the violence nearly all his guests intend to inflict on him. As an audience member, I was waiting for someone to do something. This was engagement. Then Don Giovanni runs off with Zerlina, apparently to have (consensual? nonconsensual? See Iris' post about the difficulty to distinguish which.) sex with her. The Elmer Fudd Masetto was being kept in a corner by dancing girls. How do we save her? What to do? As Cavell points out, the fact that I was held back from running down four flights of stairs, up the aisle and into the wing to save her myself is relevant in itself and shows that I'm in a moment of catharsis: "what is revealed is my separateness from what is happening to them; that I am I, and here" (153-154). By being separate, I am joined with the rest of the audience, also separate. By feeling the desire to save her, I am involved.

P.S. To read the reverse, then, the scenes with the least spectacularity should be the least transporting. This is where my argument falls apart here, since some of the other strong scenes were far simpler (Donna Elvira's self-struggle on the balcony when she leaves with Leporello; the song between Zerlina and Masetto when she's asking for forgiveness). However, I only offer the Cavell+Auslander discussion as one effective way to create transport, not the only way. It seems to be particularly effective for opera, though, which is so "unsettled" that extravagance can somewhat mask its schizophrenic form.