Venus and Adonis
Venus and Adonis is the mythological story of the encounter between the Roman goddess of love (Venus) and a boy hunter (Adonis).
Contents
The original text
The original source is Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Book 10) where a wounded Adonis is killed by a wild boar and transformed into an anemone flower, with Venus willingly loved by Adonis. Shakespeare wrote his own version of Venus and Adonis (1593), a comic, erotic, and tragic narrative poem where an indifferent Adonis rejects the goddess's advances to go hunting.
International stage versions
- Venus and Adonis is an opera in three acts and a prologue by the English Baroque composer John Blow, composed between 1681 - 1684.
- Vénus et Adonis is an opera in a prologue and 5 acts composed by Henri Desmarets to a libretto by Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, it was first performed by the Académie Royale de Musique at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal in Paris on 28 July 1697.
South African stage versions
Isango Ensemble created their own version Venus and Adonis, which was performed at Shakespeare's Globe in London in 2012 and again in 2013.
Performance history in South Africa
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_and_Adonis_(opera)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vénus_et_Adonis
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