Phantom Thoughts pt. 8

[zellephantom]

{Raoul leaned against the panel to ease his pain. His heart, which had seemed gone for ever, returned to his breast and was throbbing loudly. The whole passage echoed with its beating and Raoul's ears were deafened. Surely, if his heart continued to make such a noise, they would hear it inside, they would open the door and the young man would be turned away in disgrace.}

Poor heartbroken Raoul. Feelings can be intense, especially young love. One minute, you're on cloud nine and the next you're down in the dumps. His current feelings remind me of this line from Charles Dance's Phantom in the 90s miniseries: "When you sing, I live in the Heavens. When you do not, down below."

I really want to know why his heart (presumably referring to romantic feelings?) had seemed "gone forever". Did he catch feelings for a nice foreign girl on his trip around the world, only to be rejected and forever parted from her? Is he just numb from Philippe's attempts to find him a girl in Paris? Had he buried his feelings in pursuit of a Navy career?

{What a position for a Chagny! To be caught listening behind a door!}

And yet he's not leaving... And he eavesdrops even more later in the novel, if I'm not mistaken...
Maybe this is just his mental interjection of 'What would Philippe do?', the answer being 'find a nice girl to flirt with while you're on furlough but don't marry her if she's not of high enough social status ALSO DON'T EAVESDROP AND SHAME THE FAMILY NAME'.

{The man's voice spoke again: "Are you very tired?"

"Oh, to-night I gave you my soul and I am dead!" Christine replied.

"Your soul is a beautiful thing, child," replied the grave man's voice, "and I thank you. No emperor ever received so fair a gift. THE ANGELS WEPT TONIGHT."}

Oh, my E/C shipper heart is bursting with feels!

But I'm still wondering if Raoul, due to his worries about his heartbeat being too loud, missed part of the conversation after "I sing only for you". Or maybe the Phantom is just trying to segue away from a topic that is clearly making Christine upset. (Now I have the mental image of the Phantom riding around on a Segway. Enjoy!)

Oooh, change in descriptions. First, he was masterful, and now he is merely grave (and probably feeling old and solemn and tired and reverent all at once).

I should also write a meta about the Phantom calling Christine 'Angel' in ALW, despite him being the one in the Angel role.

Comments

[igenlode]

I really want to know why his heart (presumably referring to romantic feelings?) had seemed "gone forever". Did he catch feelings for a nice foreign girl on his trip around the world, only to be rejected and forever parted from her? Is he just numb from Philippe's attempts to find him a girl in Paris? Had he buried his feelings in pursuit of a Navy career?

It's a reference to an earlier description in another large chunk of text omitted by de Mattos(!), where we are told that Christine's voice had created the sensation in Raoul of his heart having been torn clean out of his breast, such that he experienced physical pain as if there were a literal hole inside his body, "an actual void that could never again be refilled save by receiving the heart of the other", i.e. Christine.

As a result, de Mattos then translates "Il avait toujours cette affreuse douleur à la place du coeur" -- "he still had that terrible pain where his heart should have been" -- as simply "he felt a terrible pain at his heart", omitting the entire sensation of the heart being missing (and then later on making its presence known at the moment when he discovers that Christine's heart is apparently already given to someone else).

Someone really ought to do a thesis on the abridgement choices in "The Phantom of the Opera" and the contexts in which they occur, and consequent effects on the various characters. I'm pretty certain that Raoul is overwhelmingly the victim of the random omissions, but it may just be that those were the bits that I was most conscious of missing -- there is some major doctoring of Christine's ordeal in Erik's lair, as well, which may well be deliberate censorship.

(We're also missing the image here of Raoul attempting to 'muzzle' his recalcitrant heart, like a barking dog...)