The Extraordinary Operatic Adventures of Blanche Arral (Amadeus) - Hardcover

Arral, Blanche

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1574670778 ISBN 13: 9781574670776

Publisher: Amadeus, 2003

Synopsis

Born in Belgium as Clara Lardinois, the youngest of 17 children, Blanche Arral, was destined for a life wilder than fiction. During her travels, Arral befriended such legendary figures as Sarah Bernhardt, Mata Hari, Harry Houdini, Victor Hugo, Franz Liszt, Camille Saint-Saëns and Jack London, who based a character on her in his book Smoke Bellew. In Russia she met Rasputin, and in Turkey, the sultan Abdülhamid II. She describes her recording sessions with Thomas Edison and her run-ins with the difficult Nellie Melba.

Writer and opera fan Ira Glackens discovered her living in a small New Jersey apartment and persuaded her to record her extraordinary stories. More than 60 years later, editor William R. Moran has confirmed the veracity of Arral's account and annotated this extraordinary memoir.

About this title

Reviews

Arral (nee Claire Lardinois in Liege, Belgium in 1864) lived a wild life for a woman of any century. After performing at the Opera Comique in Paris, she honed her singing talents on the international opera circuit, met and married a Russian prince (who died soon after), and performed for the sultan of Turkey before barely escaping from a harem. Initially spearheaded by the late Glackens, son of painter William Glackens and an opera aficionado and record collector, this fine autobiography was actually completed in 1937 but has not come to light until now. Moran, founder of the Stanford Archive of Recorded Sound and an editor of Amadeus's "Opera Biography" series, has skillfully edited Glackens's translation. Arral had mostly disappeared from the public eye when Glackens discovered her in Cliffside Park, NJ, where she had settled down with a man 25 years her junior, and persuaded her to write her amazing memoirs. Her life reads like fiction and will enjoy a wide audience among opera lovers. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries.
Robert T. Ivey, Univ. of Memphis
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

From Chapter 10:

At that moment the door opened and Rasputin entered.

He stood at the threshold, looking first at Sidonie and then at me, astonished to find strangers present. His eyes were powerful and penetrating! It was as if they actually made a physical contact with their object. I distinctly wished for a trapdoor through which to vanish like Doctor Miracle. With an effort, I collected myself.

Our host advanced, smiling, and said, "Madame Fremaux and Mademoiselle Lardinois." Rasputin made a gesture with his hand, perhaps meant to convey a blessing, and without removing his eyes from me, spoke in Russian. Father Lagrange answered in Russian, explaining our presence. The monk's eyes sobered at once, becoming very peaceful and dreamy, with the calm of a young tiger. Then he glided forward (he really did not seem to walk with human steps) and, arranging his long robe so that it touched my knee, seated himself beside me.

At first glimpse he had appeared tall, svelte, and with a suggestion of great physical health. Now, seated beside me, he seemed to have contracted and diminished. His hair, greasy and unkempt, fell limp and dank over his shoulders. His beard was thin and long, looking more like a goat's whiskers than human ones, and he stroked the end of it as he listened to his host. His manner was nervous, and his black robe, which looked as if it had been slept in, displayed his long yellow hands in startling relief. Further, I must state that if indeed he was the saintly person he declared himself to be, then I had a very clear notion of the odor of sanctity!

From Chapter 20:

We had other passengers beside the little photographer---every sort of creeping and crawling creature an entomologist might desire. Cockroaches were everywhere, including the captain's beard. There was no such thing as a cabin, much less a bed or bearth. A place was fixed for me on the floor, and here I attempted to sleep, covered with veils and wrapped with every garment that might keep at bay the insect world.

From Chapter 25:

I was still very tired from my protracted work, and one afternoon I went to my room intending to have a good rest before dinner. My eyes ached. As I lay on the bed I told my maid, now an Englishwoman of incertain âge whom I had acquired in Australia, to bring me the small bottle of eyedrops from the dressing table. Beside the bottle stood another one, containing creosote for inhalation against colds in the head. The bottles looked something alike, though they were well marked. As I lay on the bed with the eyedropper poised and my eye open, I suddenly caught the familiar smell of creosote---too late. The drop fell. How can I describe the result? I shot up from the bed as though a bomb had burst below me. My shrieks echoed all over the little wooden hotel, and the first of the many people who crowded into my room were Jack London and his wife. To Jack London I owe the saving of my left eye. While others remained helpless and the poor maid threatened suicide (which served no purpose at all), he seized a bottle of castor oil and poured it over my eye, which was already swollen to the size and color of a hard-boiled egg and almost entirely out of its socket. I cannot paint the agony of such an accident to the eye, though one may imagine it. However, the castor oil began at once to reduce the swelling and ease the pain. My eye was covered for weeks, and I left Suva without knowing whether I was half blind or not.

Edition details

• Publisher: Amadeus
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1574670778
• ISBN 13: 9781574670776
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 352