The Phantom of the Opera (novel)
The Phantom of the Opera (French: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra) is a novel by French author Gaston Leroux. It was first published as a serial in Le Gaulois from 23 September 1909 to 8 January 1910, and was released in volume form in late March 1910 by Pierre Lafitte.[1] The novel is partly inspired by historical events at the Paris Opera at the Palais Garnier during the nineteenth century, and by an apocryphal tale concerning the use of a former ballet pupil's skeleton in Carl Maria von Weber's 1841 production of Der Freischütz.[2] It has been successfully adapted into various stage and film adaptations, most notable of which are the 1925 film depiction featuring Lon Chaney, and Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical.
This article is about the novel. For the musical and other uses, see The Phantom of the Opera (disambiguation).Author
Le Fantôme de l'Opéra
France
Pierre Laie
23 September 1909 to 8 January 1910
1911
Print (Serial)
~145 including the glossary
Le Fantôme de l'Opéra at French Wikisource
The Phantom of the Opera at Wikisource
History behind the novel[edit]
Leroux initially was going to be a lawyer, but after spending his inheritance gambling he became a reporter for L'Écho de Paris. At the paper, he wrote about and critiqued dramas, as well as being a courtroom reporter. With his job, he was able to travel frequently, but he returned to Paris where he became a writer. Because of his fascination with both Edgar Allan Poe and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, he wrote a detective mystery entitled The Mystery of the Yellow Room in 1907, and four years later he published Le Fantôme de l'Opéra.[3] The novel was first published in newspapers before finally being published as a book.
The setting of The Phantom of the Opera is the actual Paris opera house, the Palais Garnier. Leroux had heard the rumours about the time the opera house was finished, and these rumours became closely linked with the novel: Act One of the opera Hellé had just finished when a fire in the roof of the opera house melted through a wire holding a counterweight for the chandelier, causing a crash that injured several and killed one. Using this accident paired with rumours of a ghost in that same opera house, Leroux wrote Le Fantôme de l'Opéra and published it in 1910, which was later published in English as The Phantom of the Opera.[4] The underground "lake" that he wrote about, in reality an enormous cistern, does exist beneath the opera house, and it is still used for training firefighters to swim in the dark.[5][6]
The serialized version contains an entire chapter ("L'enveloppe magique") that does not appear in the novel version—though much of its content was added in other chapters—and was not reprinted in English until 2014.[7]
Themes[edit]
Music[edit]
Leroux uses the operatic setting in The Phantom of the Opera to use music as a device for foreshadowing.[8] Ribière makes note that Leroux was once a theatre critic and his brother was a musician, so he was knowledgeable about music and how to use it as a framing device. She uses the example of how Leroux introduces Danse macabre which means "dance of death" in the gala scene which foreshadows the graveyard scene that comes later where the Phantom plays the fiddle for Christine and attacks Raoul when he tries to intervene.
Drumright points out that music is evident throughout the novel in that it is the basis for Christine and Erik's relationship. Christine sees Erik as her Angel of Music that her father promised would come to her one day. The Phantom sees Christine as his musical protégé, and he uses his passion for music to teach her everything he knows.[9]
Mystery[edit]
The novel is styled as a mystery novel, as its frame is narrated by a detective acquiring his information through various investigations.[10] The mystery under investigation is the identity and motive of 'the Phantom' who lurks through the opera house, seemingly appearing out of nowhere as if by magic in inaccessible places. But, it seems that the mystery novel frame story is a façade for the genre being more a Gothic romance.[11]
Gothic horror[edit]
In his article, Fitzpatrick compares the Phantom to other monsters featured in Gothic horror novels such as Frankenstein's monster, Dr. Jekyll, Dorian Gray, and Count Dracula. The Phantom has a torture chamber where he kidnaps and kills people, and the walls of the chapel in the graveyard are lined with human bones.[11] Drumright notes that The Phantom of the Opera checks off every trope necessary to have a Gothic novel according to the Encyclopedia of Literature's description which says, "Such novels were expected to be dark and tempestuous and full of ghosts, madness, outrage, superstition, and revenge."[12] Although the Phantom is really just a deformed man, he has ghost-like qualities in that no one can ever find him or his lair and he is seen as a monster. People are frightened by him because of his deformities and the acts of violence he commits.[9]
Romance[edit]
The novel features a love triangle between the Phantom, Christine, and Raoul. Raoul is seen as Christine's childhood love whom she is familiar with and has affection for. He is rich and therefore offers her security as well as a wholesome, Christian marriage. The Phantom, on the other hand, is not familiar. He is dark, ugly and dangerous, and therefore represents the forbidden love. However, Christine is drawn to him because she sees him as her Angel of Music, and she pities his existence of loneliness and darkness.[9]
