On Leoš Janáček’s birthday, I recollect that I was on my way to see “The Makropulos Case” at the Metropolitan Opera a number of years ago, when my car broke down on the New Jersey Turnpike. I never did get to see it. Janáček’s 1925 opera – based on a play by Karel Čapek, author of the novel “War with the Newts” and the play “R.U.R.” (credited with introducing the word “robot”) – is about a 337-year-old woman who, thanks to an elixir, is preserved in the flower of youth, but comes to regard life with clinical detachment.
This is not Janáček’s only science fiction opera. Less-known, perhaps, is Janáček’s “The Excursions of Mr. Brouček to the Moon and to the 15th Century” – actually more of a fantasy, I suppose.
These got me pondering, and not for the first time, the “lowly” genre of science fiction and its unlikely influence on the high art of classical music. The topic is still fresh in my mind from having recently revisited Karl-Birger Blomdahl’s 1959 opera “Aniara,” in which a journey to Mars goes horribly wrong, thanks to, of all things, a good old-fashioned Swedish celebration of Midsummer.
During the pandemic in 2020, one of the things that kept me mentally engaged while doing menial chores around the house was compiling clues for a weekly crossword puzzle that I would post on Sunday mornings. The topic for the first week of October was “Hi-Fi Sci-Fi.”
I know tomorrow is the 4th of July and the weekend is bound to be a busy one for many, but if you’re interested in bookmarking it for later, you’ll find a link to the puzzle below. Both Janáček operas (and “Aniara”) are among the clues.
To fill out the puzzle, follow the link and select “solve online” at the bottom of the page. You’ll then be able to type directly into the squares. Once you feel you’ve exhausted the puzzle, you’ll find the solutions by clicking on “Answer Key PDF.”
Test your knowledge of “Hi-Fi Sci-Fi” here:
https://www.armoredpenguin.com/crossword/Data/2020.10/0407/04073509.417.html
Happy birthday, Leoš Janáček!
IMAGES (clockwise from upper left): Janáček; art deco stage design for “The Makropulos Case;” art nouveau cover art for libretto to “The Excursions of Mr. Brouček;” Čapek’s “Makropulos” novel