I plan to write most of my posts this month on my short novel "Isolde 1939", about a French opera singer who sang for the Nazis. The story is loosely inspired by actual events, which I will discuss in more details in the coming days. The posts will all be tagged "Isolde 1939".
While World War II continues to receive an enormous amount of interest in the literature, there has been nothing, to the best of my knowledge, combining opera and World War II. It is, of course, always timely to ask why some people take the high road in spite of the risk of torture and death and others let themselves be drawn into the orbit of madmen, but even more timely now, since we celebrate this year - and this month - the bicentenary of Richard Wagner's birth. (Wagner was not only the favorite composer of Adolf Hitler himself, but the favorite composer of the real-life French soprano who inspired my book.) My story, however, is absolutely not a biography or a historical document, but a work of fiction.
I look forward to sharing these "behind-the-scene" (in more ways than one!) stories with you.