... a most coherent, elegant, and perceptive survey of four centuries of operatic debate. This volume is a priceless addition to the literature, and the pages of my copy are already dog-eared from constant use. Music and Letters Opera: A History in Documents comes as treasure trove to the fan ... crisp, informative intros to each entry ... The extracts relating to theatres and performance are fascinating ... no true lover of opera can afford to be without this invaluable collection. Opera Now Weiss's book is a Jack Horner's pie full of plums, familiar and unfamiliar, many of them freshly and elegantly translated by Weiss himself ... a valuable and enjoyable book. Opera Weiss is head of the musicology department at John Hopkins, and the anthology that he has compiled makes up a history of opera that is learned, quirky, disjointed, spiced with the unexpected and the diversionary, and sometimes very funny; everything, in fact, that such a collection should be. Opera Excellent compilation ... a rich offering ... for students and intelligent opera lovers, the material on the operas selected will rapidly become indispensable BBC Music Magazine

• 1. Preface ; 2. The Medici Wedding Festivities of 1589 ; 3. Pietro Bardi on the Birth of Opera ; 4. L'Euridice, The Second Opera ; 5. Cavalieri's Rappresentatione di Anima, et di Corpo ; 6. Monteverdi Criticizes a Libretto ; 7. Sant'Alessio at the Barberini Palace, Rome ; 8. Opera Comes to Venic and Goes Public ; 9. Lully is Granted a Monopoly on Opera in French ; 10. Le Grand Siecle Absorbs La Tragedie en Musique ; 11. Saint-Evremond's View on Opera ; 12. The First English Operas ; 13. Handel's Rinaldo at the Haymarket Theater ; 14. Pier Jacopo Martello on Opera ; 15. The President de Brosses in Italy ; 16. Metastasio on Setting Dramatic Recitative to Music ; 17. From Rousseau's Confessions ; 18. The War of the Buffoons ; 19. Interlude: A Travelling Company ; 20. Operatic Reform in Vienna: Gluck and Calzabigi ; 21. Gluck in Paris ; 22. Mozart at Work on Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail ; 23. Gretry's Richard Couer-de-Lion ; 24. The Making of Le Nozze di Figaro ; 25. Kierkegaard's Don Giovanni ; 26. Fidelio in 1806 ; 27. Berlioz's Estimate of Spontini ; 28. E. T. A. Hoffman on "Music Drama that Springs from the Heart" ; 29. The First Performance of Il Barbiere di Siviglia ; 30. Der Freischutz: A german Triumph ; 31. Parisian Grand Opera: Auber's La Muette de Portici as Seen by Wagner ; 32. Interlude: Madame Pasta ; 33. Verdi's Own Story of How Nabucco was Composed ; 34. Verdi's Operatic Style Analysed by a Contemporary ; 35. Wagner on the Evolution of his Style ; 36. Wagner's Theory of Drama ; 37. Divergent Reactions to Boris Godonov ; 38. Tchaikovsky on Eugene Onegin ; 39. Nietzsch vs. Wagner ; 40. Vedri's Otello ; 41. Interlude: Verdi and Wagner in Vienna ; 42. Verismo ; 43. Four Men at Work on La Boheme ; 44. Pelleas et Melisande ; 45. Strauss and Hofmannsthal at Work on Der Rosenkavalier ; 46. Duke Bluebeard's Castle ; 47. Busoni and the Reinstatement of Disbelief ; 48. In Defense of Kat'a Kabanova ; 49. Alban Berg on Wozzeck ; 50. Brecht on "Epic Opera" ; 51. Shostakovich and the Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk Debacle ; 52. Interlude: An Italian Claque ; 53. Peter Grimes in Post-War London ; 54. Stravinsky, Auden, and The Rake's Progress ; 55. A First Reaction to Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites ; 56. Messaiaen's Introductory Note to Saint-Francois d'Assine ; 57. John Adams on Nixon in China ; 58. Index