'THE TROJANS'
SIR,—May I add a suggestion to those of David Cairns for improving the present Covent Garden production of The Trojans, namely, a small bid vital emendation to Dent's translation? Anyone who has heard the opera sung in the original French will testify to the thrilling effect produced by those cries of 'Italie!' which occur at climactic points in the course of the action : at the end of the scene in the Temple of Vesta; in the mouth of Mercury at the end of the garden scene (and how heartily I agree that the voice of Mercury requires a real voice in the mouth of the actor to replace the present muffled foghorn effect): and, triumphantly, as /Eneas and his men board their ships to leave Carthage. This phrase is like a beacon in the opera, symbolising the voice• of destiny. Dent has trans- lated it as `To Italia!; which quite lacks the in- cisive ring of the original and is not easy for the auditor to distinguish in the theatre. (At the first performance of this production three years ago I could not catch what was being sung at these points until I read the English libretto.) Surely it would be far better to sing 'Italy !,' thus preserving almost the identical sound of the original and making. the
sense immediately clear! The loss of a mute 'e' (even though it is not strictly mute when sung) is a small and legitimate price to pay for such an advantage.—Yours faithfully,
RICHARD GANDY
20 Melbourne Road, Teddingion, Middlesex *
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