opera (7)

ヴェネチア

Venezia

はじめて「ベニス』に行ってみたいと思ったのは小学生の頃。

家にあった「暮しの手帖」にベニスの記事があったのだ。

そこにはベニスはいつか水に沈んでしまうかもしれないようなことが書かれていて、

小学生の時だから読み違いかもしれない、

でもとにかく美しい都市が無くなってしまうというのは印象深かった。

沈まない内に見てみたいものだとも思った。

それからやはりヴィスコンティの映画。

マーラーの５番とともに心に残った。

はじめて出かけたのは冬。

霧が深くて、海に落ちそうになりながら散歩をした。

オペラハウスフェニーチェのすぐそばに宿をとったのに

オペラのチケットは取れなかった。

今度来た時には、と思っているうちに火災で消失。

そして再建されてよみがえったと新聞で読んだ。

須賀敦子さんの「ヴェネチアの宿」を読んだとき、

あの辺なのだな、と感慨深かった。

ワグナーが亡くなったのもヴェネチア。

ヴェネチアそのものもとてもオペラ的だ。

ヴェルディのオテッロも舞台はヴェネチア。

マクベスとともに、シェークスピア×ヴェルディの

たまらなく面白いオペラ。

It was in my elementary school days 

that I had first wanted to visit Venice.

I had read an article about Venice in the magazine 

"Notebook for Daily Life" found at home.

There it was written, so I believe, that Venice might sink in water someday.

It may have been my misunderstanding for, you know,

it was my schoolgirl's days.

But at that time, it was very impressive that a beautiful city might disappear.

I hoped to go there before sinking.

Next it was Visconti's cinema that impressed me deeply.

It rang in my heart with Mahler's fifth symphony.

It was in winter that I've visited Venice for the first time.

It was strolling in a thick mist feeling almost to be drawn into the sea.

Though I was staying at the hotel near Teatro La Fenice,

I couldn't get a ticket of opera.

Next time by all means, so I'd been thinking of, 

but shortly afterwards it was burnt down.

And it was reconstructed and has revived, so I read in the newspaper.

When I read an essay by Atsuko Suga

 (late Japanese woman writer who had long lived in Italy)

about a hotel near Fenice, I was much impressed

remembering that place.

It was in Venice where Wagner died.

Venice itself is just operatic.

Venice also is the stage of Otello by Verdi.

It is an exciting opera besides Macbeth by 

the combination of Verdi and Shakespeare.