more about opera: smotret' or slushat'?

[Elizaveta Moussinova]

Privet Inna! :))

Kak dela?

It might depend on the focus with which one looks at the opera. To my 
opinion, the primary focus of opera is music and voices of singers; the 
visual part is secondary. I am not sure how the cast is chosen for an 
opera exactly, but I suppose that they mainly pay attention to voices 
(soprano, tenor, etc). An adult singer may be chosen to sing a part of 
a 16-year-old thin fragile shepherdess. I think then "slushat' operu" 
is right.

Liz Moussinova
Indiana University


Quoting Inna Caron <caron.4 at OSU.EDU>:

> Here's another controversial item, also likely to be written off as an
> archaism.
>
> When I was a little girl, my parents always corrected me when I said "my
> smotreli operu," - "Operu ne smotryat, a slushayut." Now it would be as
> difficult for me to use "smotret'" (regardless of how pompous and
> pretentious it may sound to other native speakers), as to accept the
> legitimization of neuter for coffee, and not mentally wince when someone
> says "moe/chernoe kofe."
>
> So, I'm wondering - and this is not the matter of conducting a research
> - just plain curiosity:
>
> 1) Do other native Russian speakers use "smotret' operu," or "slushat'
> operu," when referring to live (not recorded) performance?
>
> 2) Do native speakers of English say "to see" or "to hear" in the same
> context?
>
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