Famous quotes containing the words opera house, rochester, opera and/or house:
“The opera house sparkled with tiers
And tiers of eyes, like mine enlarged by belladonna,”
—James Merrill (b. 1926)
“The clog of all pleasure, the luggage of life,
Is the best can be said for a very good wife.”
—John Wilmot, Earl Of Rochester (1647–1680)
“If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human willfulness; it is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to ourselves.... The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia, Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and willful state of being. In real life they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)
“What is the use of a house if you have n’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?—if you cannot tolerate the planet it is on?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)