The Politics of Opera in Handel's Britain

Contents

• 1. Introduction;
• 2. Opera and political allegory: when is it an allegory? When is it political?;
• 3. Politics in the Royal Academy of Music;
• 4. The opera house, allegory, and the political opposition;
• 5. Handel's Second Academy;
• 6. Rival opera companies and Farinelli at the Court of Madrid;
• 7. Politics, theatre, and opera in the 1730s;
• 8. The opera stage as political history; Epilogue; Appendices:
• 1. Directors of the Royal Academy of Music;
• 2. Operas of the Royal Academy of Music;
• 3. Directors of the Opera of the Nobility;
• 4. Operas of the Opera of the Nobility;
• 5. Hanoverian celebratory pieces.