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“What sort of person," said Salzella patiently, "sits down and writes a maniacal laugh? And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head. Opera can do that to a man.”
― Terry Pratchett, Maskerade

“... My mother, daroga, my poor, unhappy mother would never... let me kiss her... She used to run away... and throw me my mask!... Nor any other woman... ever, ever!... Ah, you can understand, my happiness was so great, I cried. And fell at her feet, crying... and I kissed her feet... her little feet... crying. You're crying, too, daroga... and she cried also... the angel cried!...”
― Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera

“(...) The new nine muses, Commerce, Operatic Music, Amor, Publicity, Manufacture, Liberty of Specch, Plural Voting, Gastronomy, Private Hygiene, Seaside Concert Entertainments, Painless Obstetrics and Astronomy for the People.”
― James Joyce "Ulysses"

“Stimulus: opera. Response: kill.”
― Helen Macdonald, H is for Hawk

“Opera in English, is about as sensible as baseball in Italian.”
― Henry Louis Mencken

“I like your opera - I think I will set it to music”
― Ludwig van Beethoven

“It was nothing like Roxanne singing, where it seemed that everyone's heart would have to wait until she finished before it could beat again.”
― Ann Patchett, Bel Canto

“If it really was Queen Elizabeth who demanded to see Falstaff in a comedy, then she showed herself a very perceptive critic. But even in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff has not and could not have found his true home because Shakespeare was only a poet. For that he was to wait nearly two hundred years till Verdi wrote his last opera. Falstaff is not the only case of a character whose true home is the world of music; others are Tristan, Isolde and Don Giovanni.”
― W.H. Auden, The Dyer's Hand and Other Essays

“To be happy to be sad and sad to be happy is to sing an echo in that beautiful language called Sorrow.”
― Criss Jami, Healology

“Jugosloveni veoma vole balet i, još više, ореru. Operski pevači i pevačice uživaju veliki ugled i poštovanje u narodu. Mladi Jugosloveni i Jugoslovenke skupljaju роstere i fotografije Gertrude Munitić i Radmile Bakočević, međusobno ih razmenjuju i pokazuju јеdni drugima.”
― Dejan Novačić, SFRJ za ponavljače

“For all his claims to be just a propagandist, [Bernard Shaw's] writing has an effect nearer to that of music than most of those who have claimed to be writing "dramas of feeling." His plays are a joy to watch, not because they purport to deal with social and political problems, but because they are such wonderful displays of conspicuous waste; the conversational energy displayed by his characters is so far in excess of what their situation requires that, if it were to be devoted to practical action, it would wreck the world in five minutes. The Mozart of English letters he is not �� the music of the Marble Statue is beyond him �� the Rossini, yes. He has all the brio, humor, cruel clarity and virtuosity of that master of opera buffa.”
― W.H. Auden, The Dyer's Hand and Other Essays

“فرد تنها هنگامی احساس رهایی می کند که نه در قید احساسش باشد، نه منطقش

ایگور استراوینسکی
اپرای رکس پروگرس*”
― Stravinsky, Oedipus Rex/The Rake's Progress: English National Opera Guide 43

“** همه ی مردان دیوانه اند

ایگور استراوینسکی
اپرای رکس پروگرس”
― Stravinsky, Oedipus Rex/The Rake's Progress: English National Opera Guide 43

“هر آنکس که نمی تواند با افتخار زندگی کند، با افتخار خواهد مرد

اپرای مادام باترفلای*
*جاکومو پوچّینی”
― Giacomo Puccini, Madame Butterfly: The Story of the Opera by Giacomo Puccini

“No, no, you have driven me mad! When I think
that I had only one object in life: to give my name to an opera wench!”
― Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera

“Exposing impressionable young men to the glories of opera on their first evening at home with you tended to put the kiss of death on things, as Oliver, to his cost, had discovered over the years.”
― Anthony McDonald, Getting Orlando

“In 1857, Bizet departed for Rome and spent three years there. He studied the landscape, the culture, Italian literature and art. Musically he studied the scores of the great masters. At the end of the first year he was asked to submit a religious work as his required composition. As a self-described atheist, Bizet felt uneasy and hypocritical writing a religious piece. Instead, he submitted a comic opera. Publicly, the committee accepted, acknowledging his musical talent. Privately, the committee conveyed their displeasure. Thus, early in his career, Bizet displayed an independent spirit that would be reflected in innovative ideas in his opera composition.

[The Pearl Fishers - Georges Bizet, Virginia Opera]”
― Georges Bizet, The Pearl Fishers: French, English Language Edition, Vocal Score (Kalmus Edition)

“Poetry, Shakespeare and opera, are like mumps and should be caught when young. In the unhappy event that there is a postponement to mature years, the results may be devastating.”
― Dimitris Mita

“Whatever comes, I'll take the good--and send the rest to hell.”
― Ignaz Schnitzer, Der Zigeunerbaron: Operette in 3 Acten

“I love opera. Si. But I am old. No passion in my life, you know? I work, I walk slowly now through my years...but opera! I see, I hear that passion, Eva. Is like the passion of youth. And I live again. I feel something.”
― J.J. Brown, Vector a Modern Love Story

“Having considered Handel's tumultuous opera career and his first term at Covent Garden in the 1730s, perhaps we may dare to suggest he was one of the foremost pioneers in establishing autonomy within the traditional system of music patronage, notwithstanding his efforts to become an independent impressario often proved disappointing.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Handel's Path to Covent Garden

“Handel's yearning for independence from the traditional chains of patronage and his persistence in monitoring his productions resulted with unique developments concerning Baroque 'opera seria'; however, paradoxically his personal obsession to obtain complete artistic freedom generated disastrous side-effects that eventually impeded the progress of opera in London.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Handel's Path to Covent Garden

“Chacun à son goût!”
― Karl Haffner Richard Genée

“AESTHETICS OF OPERA

Don’t sing an aria
To someone who can’t
Sing one back.”
― Kenneth Koch, The Collected Poems

“She imagined that each of them saw the story in a different light based on their own experience, or lack of it. That, then, was the beauty of opera to her. Giving the gift of a performance, of song that was transformed after it left her mouth into a different story for each member of the audience as it entered their thoughts, each night, dependent only on their unique and hidden inner needs.”
― J.J. Brown, Vector a Modern Love Story

“Winterstürme wichen dem Wonnemond,
In mildem Lichte leuchtet der Lenz.”
― Richard Wagner

“Giovanni always had music running through his head. Moments he experienced in life recalled for him scenes from operas. [Giovanni Tempesta]”
― Vincent B. Chip LoCoco, Tempesta's Dream

“He was a throwback to a lady's old romantic notion of how a man should act. [Giovanni Tempesta]”
― Vincent B. Chip LoCoco, Tempesta's Dream

“Wagner thought Rossini unserious; Rossini thought Wagner 'lacked sun'. Wagner also became the butt of a phrase Rossini had used down the years to describe musicians about whom he had certain reservations - "He has some beautiful moments but some bad quarters of an hour!”
― Richard Osborne, Rossini

“Tutto questo è stato descritto migliaia di volte, e forse non vale la pena di soffermarsi su quest'opera sordida e fetida. D'altro canto, non è forse nemmeno utile, né molto sensato, paragonare la guerra a un'opera, oltretutto l'opera non ci piace granché, anche se come quest'ultima la guerra è grandiosa, enfatica, eccessiva, piena di fastidiose lungaggini, anche se fa altrettanto rumore e spesso, alla lunga, è piuttosto noiosa.”
― Jean Echenoz, 14