The Great Lover
So potent a magnet is the mere name Don Juan (even if pronounced as in this case Don Wan) that doubtless many listeners as well as myself were trapped into listening for an hour and a half to Hugh Ross Williamson’s rather dreary play The Death of Don Juan.
Difficult, possibly, to depict a Great Lover over the air (John Barrymore, I remember, did such lovely leaps from balcony to ground and vice versa). This Don Juan’s verbal lovemaking was maddeningly chivalrous, his kisses, unkindly caught by the microphone, too smacking | to rank as seductive, the philosophic cloak flung over him by his creator too thin to disguise the fact that he was essentially. passé. The monastery background was by contrast richly macabre -I particularly enjoyed the Feast of the Dead, the tolling bells, the rise and fall of the Dies Irae, and the close-up of Brother Isodore’s death rattle. And I feel grateful for the selfless characterisation of Brother Mark by Selwyn Too- | good.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19530717.2.22.7
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 731, 17 July 1953, Page 11
Word count
Tapeke kupu
168The Great Lover New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 731, 17 July 1953, Page 11
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Material in this publication is protected by copyright.
Are Media Limited has granted permission to the National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa to develop and maintain this content online. You can search, browse, print and download for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Are Media Limited for any other use.
Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
Copyright in the Denis Glover serial Hot Water Sailor published in 1959 is owned by Pia Glover. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this serial and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the Listener. You can search, browse, and print this serial for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Pia Glover for any other use.
Log in