The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #163928   Message #3917301
Posted By: keberoxu
14-Apr-18 - 09:19 PM
Thread Name: What Do People Do...
Subject: RE: What Do People Do...
Oh dear me, Guest.
You are correct about Hitler, of course:

"Ich habe in meinem ganzen Leben,
eine solche Isolde nie gesehn nie gehört!"
So spoke Hitler to a soprano named Germaine Lubin. Scared the heck out of her.
Lubin is quoted reminiscing, above, in an out-of-print book
called "The Last Prima Donnas" by the late Lanfranco Rasponi,
whose previous claim to fame was being publicist for Renata Tebaldi.
The book has its faults; it is at its best when Rasponi, as interviewer,
gets out of the ladies' way and just lets them do the talking.

Germaine Lubin is unforgettable. What was a soprano with a French name,
you ask, doing singing the female lead in Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde"?
As I recall, Mme. Lubin had mixed ethnic ancestry, and there must have been what the French would call a "pied-noir" from north Africa
in generations past; she declared that her mixed races included the Berber/kabyle/Tamazight people who inhabited the north African Mediterranean before the Arabs moved West.
Were there Germans in her ancestors as well? I forget.

Whatever, French in birth and career though she was,
Lubin had voice and temperament suited to Wagner, and sang it.
And yes she sang for Hitler.
The trouble that got her into... well, you have to read the book.
She ended up on trial after WWII, had to prove that she worked long and hard
for the French Resistance, and was not a collaborator after all.
She makes Maria Callas sound like a spoiled brat by comparison.

Where were we?

GUEST, who prefers anonymity,
sounds like the one with the lack of ... I'm not sure what.
I reckon Bat Goddess is less bothered by the judgmental comment
than it bothers me.

In Bat Goddess's OP I see no judgmentalism nor lack of empathy.
I observe a carefully judged sharing of one's own experience in the first person.
I don't see any proselytizing. Preaching to the choir, if anything.

As for me, the word "personal" counts for a great deal,
both reading the OP and thinking of my experience.
Sorry, I have to keep my own experience private here
as I feel very sensitive indeed about it, there is suffering there.

In short, I envy Bat Goddess the unqualified joy of her testifying.
And what's wrong with joy?