This will only confirm how unspeakable I was as a nipper. This short French opera about a mischievous boy who smashes up his bedroom and hurts nearby animals, then learns his lesson when the objects come to life and the animals start talking (think Where the Wild Things Are meets Disney’s Beauty and The Beast) absolutely fascinated me at about the same time I was enjoying Bobby Brewster stories. My parents had an LP which featured Colette’s short libretto in French (with bits of English sprinkled around too) and even though I didn’t speak any of the language I used to follow the text while the record played because I found the sound mixture of words and music quite haunting. Sometimes I just looked at the words without playing the music. Strange little boy.
Monte Carlo, 1925
A Personal Anthology 