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Benjamin Britten. The last works of any artist take on a different meaning in the minds of audiences and critics, for they are inevitably read as the definitive final statement, the finale of a career, what Alfred Einstein called the “opera ultima.”

The subject of this talk, which is a joint endeavor by a critical theorist and a medical doctor, is Britten’s declining health in his last years and the impact of this upon his creativity. It examines both Britten’s last opera and the final shorter works he composed after his cardiac surgery, a few years before his death, for what they can teach us about late style in general and Britten’s personal (artistic and psychological) variant in particular.

Michael and Linda Hutcheon teach at the University of Toronto. Linda holds the rank of University Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Michael Hutcheon is Professor of Medicine and Deputy Physician in Chief for Education at the Toronto Health Network. LH is the author of nine (solo) books on contemporary culture and theory; MH has published widely in the fields of medical education as well as lung transplantation. The two have worked collaboratively and across their very different disciplines on the intersection of medical and cultural history, using opera as their vehicle of choice. They have given many lectures and published a number of articles and three books so far: Opera: Desire, Disease, Death (1996); Bodily Charm: Living Opera (2000); Opera: The Art of Dying (2004). They are currently studying creativity and aging through the late style and later lives of nineteenth- and twentieth-century opera composers.

SPONSORS: Arts, Humanities and Medicine Program, èצӰ�� Center for Biomedical Ethics; Comparative Literature; Continuing Studies Program; Deans Office, School of Humanities and Sciences; Department of English; Division of Literatures, Cultures and Languages; Department of Music; Office of the Provost; Program in Modern Thought and Literature; èצӰ�� Institute for Creativity and the Arts

For information, contact palboliu [at] stanford.edu (palboliu[at]stanford[dot]edu)