Deathday: Kurt Weill, Composer "The Threepenny Opera"

Kurt Julian Weill (March 2, 1900[1] – April 3, 1950[1]), was a German, and in his later years American, composer active from the 1920s until his death. He was a leading composer for the stage. He also wrote a number of works for the concert hall.

Early life

Kurt Julian Weill was born on March 2, 1900,[2] the third of four children to Albert Weill (1867–1950) and Emma Weill née Ackermann (1872–1955). He grew up in a religious Jewish family in the "Sandvorstadt", the Jewish quarter in Dessau, Germany, where his father was a cantor.[1] At the age of twelve, Kurt Weill started taking piano lessons and made his first attempts at writing music; his earliest preserved composition was written in 1913 and is titled Mi Addir. Jewish Wedding Song.[3]

In 1915, Weill started taking private lessons with Albert Bing, Kapellmeister at the "Herzogliche Hoftheater zu Dessau", who taught him piano, composition, music theory, and conducting. Weill performed publicly on piano for the first time in 1915, both as an accompanist and soloist. The following years he composed numerous Lieder to the lyrics of poets such as Eichendorff, Arno Holz, and Anna Ritter, as well as a cycle of five songs titled Ofrahs Lieder to a German translation of a text by Yehuda Halevi.[4]

Weill graduated with an Abitur from the Oberrealschule of Dessau in 1918, and enrolled at the Berliner Hochschule für Musik at the age of 18, where he studied composition with Engelbert Humperdinck,[1] conducting with Rudolf Krasselt, and counterpoint with Friedrich E. Koch, and also attended philosophy lectures by Max Dessoir and Ernst Cassirer. The same year, he wrote his first string quartet (in B minor).[5]

Early work and compositions

Weill's family experienced financial hardship in the aftermath of World War I, and in July 1919, Weill abandoned his studies and returned to Dessau, where he was employed as a répétiteur at the Friedrich-Theater under the direction of the new Kapellmeister, Hans Knappertsbusch. During this time, he composed an orchestral suite in E-flat major, a symphonic poem of Rilke's The Lay of the Love and Death of Cornet Christopher Rilke as well as Schilflieder, a cycle of five songs to poems by Nikolaus Lenau. In December 1919, through the help of Humperdinck, Weill was appointed as Kapellmeister at the newly founded Stadttheater in Lüdenscheid, where he directed opera, operetta, and singspiel for five months, and also composed a cello sonata and Ninon of Lenclos, a now lost one-act operatic adaptation of a play by Ernst Hardt. From May to September 1920, Weill spent a couple of months in Leipzig, where his father had become the new director of a Jewish orphanage. Before he returned to Berlin, in September 1920, he composed Sulamith, a choral fantasy for soprano, female choir, and orchestra.

Studies with Busoni

Back in Berlin, Weill had an interview with Ferruccio Busoni in December 1920. After examining some of Weill's compositions, Busoni accepted him as one of five master students in composition at the Preußische Akademie der Künste in Berlin.[6] From January 1921 to December 1923, Weill studied music composition with him and also counterpoint with Philipp Jarnach in Berlin. During his first year he composed his first symphony, Sinfonie in einem Satz, as well as the lieder Die Bekehrte (Goethe) and two Rilkelieder for voice and piano. In order to support his family in Leipzig, he also worked as a pianist in a Bierkeller tavern. In spring of 1922, Weill joined the November Group's music faction. That year he composed a psalm, a divertimento for orchestra, and Sinfonia Sacra: Fantasia, Passacaglia, and Hymnus for Orchestra. On November 18, 1922, his children's pantomime Die Zaubernacht (The Magic Night) premiered at the Theater am Kurfürstendamm; it was the first public performance of any of Weill's works in the field of musical theatre.[7]

Out of financial need, Weill taught music theory and composition to private students from 1923 to 1925. Among his students were Claudio Arrau, Maurice Abravanel, Henry (then known as Heinz) Jolles[8], and Nikos Skalkottas. Arrau, Abravenel, and Jolles, at least, would remain members of Weill's circle of friends thereafter,[9] and Jolles's sole surviving composition predating the rise of the Nazi regime in 1933 is a fragment of a work for four pianos he and Weill wrote jointly.[8] Weill's compositions during his last year of studies included Quodlibet, an orchestral suite version of Die Zaubernacht, Frauentanz, seven medieval poems for soprano, flute, viola, clarinet, french horn, and bassoon, and Recordare for choir and children's choir to words from the Book of Lamentations. Further premieres that year included a performance of his Divertimento for Orchestra by the Berlin Philharmonic under the direction of Heinz Unger on April 10, 1923, and the Hindemith-Amar Quartet's rendering of Weill's String Quartet op. 8, on June 24, 1923. In December 1923, Weill finished his studies with Busoni.[10]

Success in the 1920s and early 1930s

In February 1924 the conductor Fritz Busch introduced him to the dramatist Georg Kaiser, with whom Weill would have a long-lasting creative partnership resulting in several one-act operas. At Kaiser's house in Grünheide, Weill also first met the actress and future wife Lotte Lenya in summer 1924.[11] The couple got married twice: In 1926 and again in 1937 (following their divorce in 1933). Lenya took great care to support Weill's work, and after his death she took it upon herself to increase awareness of his music, forming the Kurt Weill Foundation.

From November 1924 to May 1929, Weill wrote hundreds of reviews for the influential and comprehensive radio program guide Der deutsche Rundfunk. Hans Siebert von Heister had already worked with Weill in the November Group, and offered Weill the job shortly after becoming editor-in-chief.[12]

Although he had some success with his first mature non-stage works (such as the String Quartet, Op. 8 or the Concerto for Violin and Wind Orchestra, Op. 12), which were influenced by Gustav Mahler, Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky, Weill tended more and more to vocal music and musical theatre. His musical theatre work and his songs were extremely popular with the wider public in Germany at the end of the 1920s and the beginning of the 1930s. Weill's music was admired by composers such as Alban Berg, Alexander von Zemlinsky, Darius Milhaud and Stravinsky, but it was also criticised by others: by Schoenberg, who later revised his opinion, and by Anton Webern.

His best-known work is The Threepenny Opera (1928), a reworking of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera written in collaboration with Bertolt Brecht. Engel directed the original production of The Threepenny Opera in 1928. It contains Weill's most famous song, "Mack the Knife" ("Die Moritat von Mackie Messer"). The stage success was filmed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst in two language versions: Die 3-Groschen-Oper and L'opéra de quat' sous. Weill and Brecht tried to stop the film adaptation through a well publicised lawsuit that Weill won and Brecht lost. Weill's working association with Brecht, although successful, came to an end over differing politics in 1930. According to Lenya, Weill commented that he was unable to "set the communist party manifesto to music."

Paris, London and New York

Weill fled Nazi Germany in March 1933. As a prominent and popular Jewish composer, he was a target of the Nazi authorities, who criticized and even interfered with performances of his later stage works, such as Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny (Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, 1930), Die Bürgschaft (1932), and Der Silbersee (1933). With no option but to leave Germany, he went first to Paris, where he worked once more with Brecht (after a project with Jean Cocteau failed) — the ballet The Seven Deadly Sins.

On April 13, 1933 his musical The Threepenny Opera was given its premiere on Broadway, but closed after 13 performances to mixed reviews.[2] In 1934 he completed his Symphony No.2, his last purely orchestral work, conducted in Amsterdam and New York by Bruno Walter, and also the music for Jacques Deval's play, Marie Galante.

A production of his operetta Der Kuhhandel (A Kingdom for a Cow) took him to London in 1935, and later that year he went to the United States in connection with The Eternal Road,[1] a "Biblical Drama" by Franz Werfel that had been commissioned by members of New York's Jewish community and was premiered in 1937 at the Manhattan Opera House, running for 153 performances. Weill and his wife, the actress and singer Lotte Lenya, settled in New York City on 10 September 1935, living first at the St. Moritz Hotel before moving on to an apartment at 231 East 62nd Street between Third and Second Avenues.[2] Weill became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1943. Weill believed that most of his work had been destroyed, and he seldom (and reluctantly) spoke or wrote German again, with the exception of, for example, letters to his parents who had escaped to Israel.

Rather than continue to write in the same style that had characterized his European compositions, Weill made a study of American popular and stage music, and his American output, though held by some to be inferior, nonetheless contains individual songs and entire shows that not only became highly respected and admired, but have been seen as seminal works in the development of the American musical. Unique among Broadway composers of the time, Weill insisted on orchestrating every note of his scores himself.[13] He worked with writers such as Maxwell Anderson and Ira Gershwin, and even wrote a film score for Fritz Lang (You and Me, 1938). Weill himself strove to find a new way of creating an American opera that would be both commercially and artistically successful. The most interesting attempt in this direction is Street Scene, based on a play by Elmer Rice, with lyrics by Langston Hughes. For his work on Street Scene Weill was awarded the inaugural Tony Award for Best Original Score.[14]

In the 1940s Weill lived in Downstate New York near the New Jersey border and made frequent trips both to New York City and to Hollywood for his work for theatre and film. Weill was active in political movements encouraging American entry into World War II, and after America joined the war in 1941, Weill enthusiastically collaborated in numerous artistic projects supporting the war effort both abroad and on the home front. He and Maxwell Anderson also joined the volunteer civil service by working as air raid wardens on High Tor Mountain between their homes in New City, New York and Haverstraw, New York in Rockland County. In 1943, he became a United States citizen.[1]

Apart from "Mack the Knife" and "Pirate Jenny" from the Threepenny Opera, his most famous songs include "Alabama Song" (from Mahagonny), "Surabaya Johnny" (from Happy End), "Speak Low" (from One Touch of Venus), "Lost in the Stars" (from the musical of that name), "My Ship" (from Lady in the Dark), and "September Song" (from Knickerbocker Holiday).

Death

Weill suffered a heart attack shortly after his 50th birthday and died on April 3, 1950 in New York City. He was buried in Mount Repose Cemetery in Haverstraw, New York. The text and music on his gravestone[15] come from the song "A Bird of Passage" from Lost in the Stars, itself adapted from a quotation from the Venerable Bede:[16]

This is the life of men on earth:
Out of darkness we come at birth
Into a lamplit room, and then -
Go forward into dark again.
(lyric: Maxwell Anderson)

Influence

Over 50 years after his death, Weill's music continues to be performed both in popular and classical contexts. In Weill's lifetime, his work was most associated with the voice of his wife, Lotte Lenya, but shortly after his death "Mack the Knife" was established by Louis Armstrong and Bobby Darin as a jazz standard. His music has since been recorded by many performers, ranging from The Doors, Judy Collins, Lou Reed, Todd Rundgren, John Zorn, Dagmar Krause, and PJ Harvey to New York's Metropolitan Opera and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. Singers as varied as Teresa Stratas, Ute Lemper, Gisela May, Anne Sofie von Otter, Max Raabe, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Marianne Faithfull have recorded entire albums of his music.

Amanda Palmer, singer/pianist of the 'Brechtian Punk Cabaret' duo The Dresden Dolls, has Kurt Weill's name on the front of her keyboard (a pun with the name of the instrument maker Kurzweil) as a tribute to the composer. In 1991, seminal Swiss Industrial music band The Young Gods released their album of Kurt Weill songs, The Young Gods Play Kurt Weill. In 2008, Weill's songs were performed by Canadian musicians (including Sarah Slean and Mary Margaret O'Hara) in a tribute concert as part of the first annual Canwest Cabaret Festival in Toronto. In 2009 Duke Special released an EP, entitled Huckleberry Finn, of five songs from an unfinished musical by Kurt Weill based on the novel by Mark Twain.

Happy Birthday Washington Irving, Author

 

Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) was an American author, essayist, biographer and historian of the early 19th century. He was best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle," both of which appear in his book The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. His historical works include biographies of George Washington, Oliver Goldsmith and Muhammad, and several histories of 15th-century Spain dealing with subjects such as Christopher Columbus, the Moors, and the Alhambra. Irving also served as the U.S. minister to Spain from 1842 to 1846.

He made his literary debut in 1802 with a series of observational letters to the Morning Chronicle, written under the pseudonym Jonathan Oldstyle. After moving to England for the family business in 1815, he achieved international fame with the publication of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. in 1819. He continued to publish regularly—and almost always successfully—throughout his life, and completed a five-volume biography of George Washington just eight months before his death, at age 76, in Tarrytown, New York.

Irving, along with James Fenimore Cooper, was among the first American writers to earn acclaim in Europe, and Irving encouraged American authors such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Edgar Allan Poe. Irving was also admired by some European writers, including Sir Walter Scott, Lord Byron, Thomas Campbell, Francis Jeffrey, and Charles Dickens. As America's first genuine internationally best-selling author, Irving advocated for writing as a legitimate profession, and argued for stronger laws to protect American writers from copyright infringement.

Irving was regularly approached by aspiring young authors for advice or endorsement, including Edgar Allan Poe, who sought Irving's comments on "William Wilson" and "The Fall of the House of Usher."

Irving also championed America's maturing literature, advocating for stronger copyright laws to protect writers from the kind of piracy that had initially plagued The Sketch Book. Writing in the January 1840 issue of Knickerbocker, he openly endorsed copyright legislation pending in the U.S. Congress. "We have a young literature," Irving wrote, "springing up and daily unfolding itself with wonderful energy and luxuriance, which... deserves all its fostering care." The legislation did not pass.

Panic Room (2002)

Panic Room is a 2002 thriller film directed by David Fincher, and starring Jodie Foster and Forest Whitaker. It also stars Jared Leto, Dwight Yoakam, and Kristen Stewart. The film tells a story of a mother and a daughter hiding in a panic room during an invasion by three armed robbers aimed at millions of dollars stored in the house.

Plot

Meg Altman (Jodie Foster), recently divorced from the owner of a pharmaceutical giant, and her 11-year-old daughter Sarah (Kristen Stewart), who has diabetes, have just purchased a four-story brownstone townhouse on West 94th Street that was previously owned by a disabled, reclusive millionaire. It has a panic room, an isolated room used to protect the owner from an intruder that is protected by a four-inch-thick steel door and an impressive security system, and features a separate phone line. On the night the two move into the home, it is broken into by Junior (Leto), the grandson of the previous owner, and Burnham (Whitaker), an employee of the security company used by the residence. The two are after $3 million in bearer bonds, which is locked inside a floor safe in the panic room. Unknown to Burnham until after they've broken in, Junior has recruited Raoul (Yoakam), a bus driver who lives in Flatbush, to assist in the heist.

After discovering that the Altmans have moved into the home one week before they anticipated, Junior convinces a reluctant Burnham to go on as planned with the heist. However, Meg wakes up and discovers the intruders from the CCTV monitors in the panic room when she wanted to switch off its glaring light. Before the three can stop her, she runs to Sarah, wakes her, and they escape to the panic room.

The Altmans make several attempts to call for help, including signaling a nearby neighbor (whom they can only see through the opening of a ventilation pipe) with a flashlight and tapping into the main telephone line to call for help (because Meg has not yet hooked up the panic room's phone). Only one works; the two get through to Meg's ex-husband and Sara's father, Stephan, before the burglars cut them off. To make matters worse, Sarah suffers a seizure due to hypoglycemia caused by her diabetes and unfortunately her emergency glucose syringe is in the refrigerator, located in her bedroom upstairs.

When all attempts to get into the room fail, Junior, who's been burned on his forearm and part of his face, lets it slip that there is much more money in the panic room than he let on, and gives up. Upon trying to leave the house, Junior is shot in the head by Raoul, who forces Burnham, at gunpoint, to finish the robbery. Stephan Altman arrives at the home and is then taken hostage by Raoul and Burnham. Raoul severely beats him. They then use the unconscious Altman to trick Meg (who is desperate to get the glucose syringe for Sarah) into momentarily exiting the panic room. Raoul ambushes her and a brief struggle ensues which ultimately results in Raoul, whose fingers are crushed by the sliding steel door, and Burnham becoming trapped in the panic room with the critical Sarah, and Meg outside with Raoul's gun. However Meg was able to throw in the glucose syringe in time and begs the two intruders over the intercom to give Sarah the injection, which Burnham, being the more humane of the two, later does.

However, two police patrolmen arrive, having received a call from Stephan earlier. With Sarah trapped with the two burglars, and Raoul threatening to kill her, Meg lies to the officers. Meanwhile, Burnham gets to work on the safe and obtains the bearer bonds, worth $22 million. As the duo attempt to leave while using Sarah as a hostage, Meg and the badly injured Stephan attack them. After an intense struggle, Burnham flees while Raoul prepares to kill Meg with a sledgehammer. However, upon hearing Sarah's screams of terror, Burnham doubles back and kills Raoul, which delays him enough that he gets caught by the police who return as the earlier patrolman was suspicious at Meg's behavior. As they approach, he releases the bonds, letting them fly off into the night and kneels in surrender.

Following the trouble with the home invasion Meg and Sarah begin searching for a new house in the newspaper.

April Scream Queen: Kristen Stewart

Kristen Jaymes Stewart (born April 9, 1990) is an American actress. She is best known for playing Bella Swan in Twilight and New Moon, and will reprise her role in Eclipse. She has also starred in films such as Panic Room, Zathura, In the Land of Women, Adventureland, The Messengers and most recently, as rock star Joan Jett in The Runaways.

Early life

Kristen Stewart was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. Her father, John Stewart, is a stage manager and television producer who has worked for Fox. Her mother, Jules Mann-Stewart, is a script supervisor originally from Maroochydore, Queensland, Australia. She has an older brother, Cameron Stewart. Stewart attended school until the seventh grade, and then continued her education by correspondence. She has since completed high school.

Career

Stewart's acting career began at the age of eight, after an agent saw her perform in her elementary school's Christmas play. Stewart's first role was a nonspeaking part in the film The Thirteenth Year. Then, she had another part in the film The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas as the "ring toss girl." She subsequently appeared in the independent film The Safety of Objects, in which she played the tomboy daughter of a troubled single mother (Patricia Clarkson). Stewart had a major role in the Hollywood film Panic Room, playing the diabetic daughter of a divorced mother (Jodie Foster). The film received generally positive reviews, and Stewart garnered positive notices for her performance.

After Panic Room's success, Stewart was cast in another thriller, Cold Creek Manor, playing the daughter of Dennis Quaid's and Sharon Stone's characters; the film generally failed at the box office. Her first starring role followed, in the children's action-comedy Catch That Kid, opposite Max Thieriot and Corbin Bleu. Stewart also played the role of Lila in the thriller Undertow. To date, Stewart's most critically acclaimed role may be in the television film Speak, based on the novel by Laurie Halse Anderson. Stewart, 13 at the time of filming, played high school freshman Melinda Sordino, who stops almost all verbal contact after being raped and who deals with enormous amounts of emotional turmoil. Stewart received great praise for playing the character, who had only a few speaking lines, but kept up a dark-witted commentary inside her head throughout the film.

In 2005, Stewart appeared in the fantasy-adventure film Zathura, playing the role of Lisa, the irresponsible older sister of two little boys, who turn their house into a spacecraft hurtling uncontrollably in outer space by playing a board game. The film received praise by critics, but Stewart's performance did not garner much media attention, as it was noted that her character is immobilized during most of the film. The following year, she played the character Maya in Fierce People, directed by Griffin Dunne. After that film, she received the lead role of Jess Solomon in the supernatural thriller film The Messengers.

In 2007, Stewart appeared as teenager Lucy Hardwicke in In the Land of Women, a romantic drama starring Meg Ryan and The O.C. star Adam Brody. The film, as well as Stewart's performance, received mixed reviews. That same year, Stewart appeared in Sean Penn's critically acclaimed adaptation film Into the Wild. For her portrayal of Tracy — a teenage singer who has a crush on young adventurer Christopher McCandless — Stewart received generally positive reviews. Salon.com considered her work a "sturdy, sensitive performance," and the Chicago Tribune noted that she did "vividly well with a sketch of a role." Her performance was not without detractors, however; Variety's critic Dennis Harvey wrote, "It's unclear whether Stewart means to be playing hippie-chick Tracy as vapid, or whether it just comes off that way." After Into the Wild, Stewart had a cameo appearance in Jumper and also appeared in What Just Happened, which was released in October 2008. She also co-stars in The Cake Eaters an independent film that has only been screened at film festivals.

On November 16, 2007, Summit Entertainment announced that Stewart would play Isabella "Bella" Swan in the film Twilight, based on Stephenie Meyer's bestselling vampire romance novel of the same name. Stewart was on the set of Adventureland when director Catherine Hardwicke visited her for an informal screen test which "captivated" the director. She stars alongside Robert Pattinson, who plays Edward Cullen, her character's vampire boyfriend. The film began production in February 2008 and finished filming in May 2008. Twilight was released domestically on November 21, 2008. After the release of Twilight, Kristen Stewart was awarded the MTV Movie Award for Best Female Performance for her portrayal as Bella Swan. Stewart reappeared as Bella in the sequel, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, and will reprise this role in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse.

Stewart will star in a film called K-11 with Nikki Reed, also of Twilight, and Jason Mewes. The film, which is being directed by Stewart's mother, takes place in a dorm of the Los Angeles County Jail, and will feature both Stewart and Reed as male characters. Stewart was also cast to portray Joan Jett in The Runaways, a biopic of the titular band from writer-director Floria Sigismondi. Stewart met with Jett over the 2008-2009 New Year to prepare for the role, and ended up prerecording songs in a studio for the upcoming film. She has recently been nominated and presented with the BAFTA Rising Star award. She also stars alongside James Gandolfini in Welcome to the Rileys, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2010.

In 2009 Stewart starred in The Yellow Handkerchief, which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival and which was released into theaters on February 26, 2010 by Samuel Goldwyn Films. In the 2010 82nd Annual Academy Awards, Stewart and Twilight co-star Taylor Lautner presented a tribute in honour of the horror movie genre.

Happy Birthday John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester "The Libertine"

 

John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester (1 April 1647 – 26 July 1680) was an English Libertine, a friend of King Charles II, and the writer of much satirical and bawdy poetry.

Poe Forward's John Wilmot Poetry Page

He was the toast of the Restoration court and a patron of the arts. He married an heiress, Elizabeth Malet, and had many mistresses, including the actress Elizabeth Barry.

Life

Rochester was born in Ditchley, Oxfordshire. His father, Henry, Viscount Wilmot, a hard-drinking Royalist from Anglo-Irish stock, had been named Earl of Rochester in 1652 for military services to Charles II during his exile under the Commonwealth; he died abroad in 1658, two years before the restoration of the monarchy in England. His mother Anne St. John was a Royalist by descent and a staunch Anglican.

At the age of twelve, Rochester matriculated at Wadham College, Oxford, and there, it is said, he "grew debauched".[1] At fourteen he was awarded the degree of M.A. by Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, who was Chancellor to the University and Rochester's uncle. After carrying out a Grand Tour of France and Italy, Rochester returned to London, where he graced the Restoration court. Later, his courage in a sea-battle against the Dutch made him a hero.

In 1667 he married Elizabeth Malet, a witty heiress whom he had attempted to abduct two years earlier. Samuel Pepys describes the event in his diary for 28 May 1665:

Thence to my Lady Sandwich's, where, to my shame, I had not been a great while before. Here, upon my telling her a story of my Lord Rochester's running away on Friday night last with Mrs. Mallett, the great beauty and fortune of the North, who had supped at White Hall with Mrs. Stewart, and was going home to her lodgings with her grandfather, my Lord Haly, by coach; and was at Charing Cross seized on by both horse and foot men, and forcibly taken from him, and put into a coach with six horses, and two women provided to receive her, and carried away. Upon immediate pursuit, my Lord of Rochester (for whom the King had spoke to the lady often, but with no successe [sic]) was taken at Uxbridge; but the lady is not yet heard of, and the King mighty angry, and the Lord sent to the Tower.[2]

Rochester's life was divided between domesticity in the country and a riotous existence at court, where he was renowned for drunkenness, vivacious conversation, and "extravagant frolics" as part of the Merry Gang[3] (as Andrew Marvell called them). The Merry Gang flourished for about 15 years after 1665 and included Henry Jermyn; Charles Sackville, Earl of Dorset; John Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave; Henry Killigrew; Sir Charles Sedley; the playwrights William Wycherley and George Etherege; and George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham. Much of Rochester's poetry suggests that he was bisexual.

Rochester was fascinated by the theatre and was the model for the witty, poetry-reciting rake Dorimant in George Etherege's The Man of Mode (1676). According to an often repeated anecdote, his coaching of his mistress Elizabeth Barry began her career as the greatest actress of the Restoration stage.

In 1674, Rochester wrote a satire on Charles II (variously known simply as "Satyr" and by its first line, "In the Isle of Britain"), which criticised the King for being obsessed with sex at the expense of his kingdom. Charles reacted by briefly exiling Rochester from the court. During his brief exile, Rochester appears to have spent time at his estate in Adderbury and perhaps also posing as a merchant in London's old city. He then returned to his seat in the House of Lords after an absence of about seven weeks.[4]

Rochester fell into disfavor again in 1676. During a late-night scuffle with the night watch — a scuffle probably provoked by Rochester himself — one of Rochester's companions was killed by a pike-thrust. Rochester was reported to have fled the scene.[5]

Following this incident, Rochester briefly went underground, impersonating a quack physician, "Doctor Bendo." Under this persona, he claimed skill in treating "barrenness," i.e. infertility, and other gynecological disorders. Gilbert Burnet wryly noted that Rochester's practice was "not without success," implying his intercession of himself as surreptitious sperm donor.[6] On occasion, Rochester also assumed the role of the grave and matronly Mrs. Bendo, presumably so that he could inspect young women privately without arousing their suspicions.[7]

By the age of 33, Rochester was dying, presumably from syphilis, gonorrhea, other venereal diseases, as well as the effects of alcoholism. His mother had him attended in his final weeks by her religious associates, particularly Gilbert Burnet, who later became the Bishop of Salisbury. A deathbed renunciation of atheism was published and promulgated as the conversion of a prodigal. This became legendary, reappearing in numerous pious tracts over the next two centuries. Because the first published account of this story appears in Burnet's own writings, some have disputed its accuracy, suggesting that he shaped the account to enhance his own reputation. However, other sources, including documents signed by Rochester, confirm that in his final months his thoughts turned towards religion and the afterlife. In the early morning of 26 July, 1680, Rochester died 'without a shudder or a sound'.[8] Rochester was later buried at Spelsbury Church in Spelsbury, Oxfordshire.

Works

Because his interest in poetry was not professional, Rochester's poetic work varies widely in form, genre, and content. He was part of a "mob of gentlemen who wrote with ease",[9] who continued to produce their poetry in manuscripts, rather than in publication. As a consequence, some of Rochester's work deals with topical concerns, such as satires of courtly affairs in libels, to parodies of the styles of his contemporaries, such as Sir Charles Scroope. He is also notable for his impromptus,[10] one of which is a teasing epigram of King Charles II:

God bless our good and gracious king,

Whose promise none relies on;

Who never said a foolish thing,

Nor ever did a wise one.

To which Charles is reputed to have replied:

"That is true; for my words are my own, but my actions are those of my ministers."[11]

His poetry displays a wide range of learning, and a wide range of influences. These included imitations of Malherbe, Ronsard, and Boileau. Rochester also translated or adapted from classical authors such as Petronius, Lucretius, Ovid, Anacreon, Horace, and Seneca.

Rochester's writings were at once admired and infamous. A Satyr Against Mankind (1675), one of the few poems he published (in a broadside in 1679) is a scathing denunciation of rationalism and optimism that contrasts human perfidy with animal wisdom.

The majority of his poetry was not published under his name until after his death. Because most of his poems circulated only in manuscript form during his lifetime, it is likely that much of his writing does not survive. Burnet claimed that Wilmot's conversion experience led him to ask that “all his profane and lewd writings” be burned; it is unclear how much, if any, of Rochester's writing was destroyed.

Rochester was also interested in the theatre. In addition to an interest in the actresses, he wrote an adaptation of Fletcher's Valentinian (1685), a scene for Sir Robert Howard's The Conquest of China, a prologue to Elkanah Settle's The Empress of Morocco (1673), and epilogues to Sir Francis Fane's Love in the Dark (1675), Charles Davenant's Circe, a Tragedy (1677).

The best-known dramatic work attributed to Rochester, Sodom, or the Quintessence of Debauchery, has never been successfully proven to be written by him. However, supposed posthumous printings of Sodom gave rise to prosecutions for obscenity, and were destroyed. On 16 December 2004 one of the few surviving copies of Sodom was sold by Sotheby's for £45,600.[12]

Influence

Rochester has not lacked distinguished admirers. His contemporary Aphra Behn lauded him in verse and also based several rakish characters in her plays on Rochester. Anne Wharton wrote an elegy marking Rochester's death, which itself came to be praised by contemporary poets.[13] Horace Walpole described him as "a man whom the muses were fond to inspire but ashamed to avow".[14] Daniel Defoe quoted him in Moll Flanders,[15] and discussed Rochester in other works. Tennyson would recite from him with fervour.[citation needed] Voltaire, who spoke of Rochester as "the man of genius, the great poet", admired Rochester's satire for "energy and fire" and translated some lines into French to "display the shining imagination his lordship only could boast."[16] Goethe quoted A Satyr against Reason and Mankind in English in his Autobiography.[17] William Hazlitt commented that Rochester's "verses cut and sparkle like diamonds"[18] while his "epigrams were the bitterest, the least laboured, and the truest, that ever were written".[19] Referring to Rochester's perspective, Hazlitt wrote that "his contempt for everything that others respect almost amounts to sublimity."[19]

 

In drama and film

Wilmot served as the model for the witty, amoral nobleman Dorimant in George Etherege's Restoration Comedy The Man of Mode.

The libertine character in Aphra Behn's Restoration comedy The Rover, Willmore, was assumed by contemporaries to have been modeled on John Wilmot.[20]

Two plays have been directly written about Rochester's life. Stephen Jeffreys wrote The Libertine in 1994; it was staged by the Royal Court Theatre. Craig Baxter wrote The Ministry of Pleasure, which was produced at the Latchmere Theatre in London, in 2004.

The film The Libertine, based on Jeffreys's play, was shown at the 2004 Toronto Film Festival and was released in the UK on November 25, 2005. While taking some artistic liberties, it chronicles Rochester's life, with Johnny Depp as Rochester, Samantha Morton as Elizabeth Barry, John Malkovich as King Charles II, and Rosamund Pike as Elizabeth Malet. Michael Nyman set to music an excerpt of his famous poem, "Signor Dildo" for the film.

Rochester's work and background figures centrally in "Last Bus to Woodstock", an episode of the British TV crime drama Inspector Morse.

 

Notes

1.^ Google books Thomas Hearne, Philip Bliss, and John Buchanan-Brown, The Remains of Thomas Hearne: Reliquiae Hearnianae; Being Extracts from His MS Diaries (London: Fontwell (Sx.) Centaur P., 1966). 122. Accessed May 5, 2007
2.^ Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete 1665 N.S. at Project Gutenberg Samuel Pepys, entry for 26 May 1665, Diary of Samuel Pepys May 28, 1665. Accessed May 5, 2007
3.^ Google books Charles Beauclerk, Nell Gwyn: Mistress to a King (New York: Grove, 2005), 272. Accessed May 15, 2007
4.^ Johnson, Profane Wit, 182-83
5.^ Johnson, Profane Wit, 250-53
6.^ Timbs, John. Doctors and patients, or, Anecdotes of the Medical World and Curiosities of Medicine. London: Richard Bentley and Son (1876), p.151.
7.^ Alcock, Thomas. "Epistle Dedicatory" to Lord Rochester, _The Famous Pathologist or The Noble Mountebank._" Ed. and introd. Vivian de Sola Pinto. Nottingham: Sisson and Parker Ltd. (1961), pp. 35-38
8.^ Johnson, Profane Wit, 327-43
9.^ Alexander Pope, "First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace", line 108.
10.^ Rochester composed at least 10 versions of Impromptus on Charles II luminarium.org
11.^ A thorough discourse concerning this epigram and the king's response can be found from the 19th to 21st paragraph of the Forward of the "The Tryal of William Penn and William Mead" [1]
12.^ IN BRIEF: Trump picks new 'Apprentice'; Bawdy 17th century play auctioned
13.^ Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at the Yale University
14.^ Horace Walpole, A Catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England, 1758.
15.^ Moll Flanders at Project Gutenberg Daniel Defoe, The Life And Misfortunes of Moll Flanders
16.^ Great Books Online, François Marie Arouet de Voltaire (1694–1778). "Letter XXI—On the Earl of Rochester and Mr. Waller" Letters on the English. The Harvard Classics. 1909–14, Bartleby.com, Accessed May 15, 2007
17.^ Notes and Queries, No.8, Dec 22, 1849 at Project Gutenberg Goethe quotes Rochester without attribution.
18.^ William Hazlitt, Select British Poets (1824)
19.^ William Hazlitt, Lectures on the English Poets at Project Gutenberg
20.^ Diamond, Elin, "Gestus and Signature in Aphra Behn's The Rover." English Literary History (ELH), Vol. 56, No. 3 (Autumn, 1989): 528.

Further reading

Some Account of the Life and Death of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester by Gilbert Burnet (Munroe and Francis, 1812)
Greene, Graham (1974). Lord Rochester's Monkey, being the Life of John Wilmot, Second Earl of Rochester. New York: The Bodley Head. ASIN B000J30NL4.
Johnson, James William (2004). A Profane Wit: The Life of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. Rochester, NY.: University of Rochester Press. ISBN 1-58046-170-0.
Lamb, Jeremy (New edition, 2005). So Idle a Rogue: The Life and Death of Lord Rochester. Sutton. pp. 288 pages. ISBN 0-7509-3913-3.
Wilmot, John (1999). The Works of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. Ed. Harold Love.. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198183674.
Wilmot, John; David M. Vieth, ed. (New edition, 2002). The Complete Poems of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. pp. 256 pages. ISBN 0-300-09713-1.
Wilmot, John (2002). The Debt to Pleasure. New York: Routledge. pp. 140 pages. ISBN 0-415-94084-2.