This weekly feature is a place to discuss new developments in fields of history and archaeology. This can be newly discovered documents and archaeological sites, recent publications, documents that have just become publicly available through digitization or the opening of archives, and new theories and interpretations.
So the big news in opera this week, of course, is someone dumping human ashes into the orchestra pit at the MET. There's a reason this happened at the MET and not say the NY Philharmonic and the reason is this: opera fanatics are insane. Then, now, and forever, opera has the absolutely craziest patrons of any art, no contest. Or as the recently un-anonymous blogger Likely Impossibilities put it more kindly:
[...] this is such a typical opera fan gesture: ridiculous, morbid, sincere, and anachronistic. So much of opera is about something that is lost, and grief is not reasonable.
Opera is a passionate art. It attracts passionate people. I understand his feelings. And I mean, the real question is... why hasn't it happened before? Cremation rates are rising rapidly. "Wildcat scattering" at baseball diamonds is practically passe, it's so common.
...Or hasn't it? A Slipped Disc commentor claims it happened before in 1854, and cites the original edition of Berlioz's memoirs, which are CONVENIENTLY not online, only the edited publicly published version available after his death. So if anyone has access to the edition he breezily cites, let me know please, because it's kinda killing me not being able to verify that this is a real anecdote.