Post by Deleted on Sept 24, 2006 7:16:17 GMT 1
I was born in a town outside of Rouen, France.My father was a master-mason. I was hideous back then as well, and a "subject of horror and terror" to them both, and eventually ran away at a young age. I was seen to frequent some fairs as an attraction, shown as "le mort vivant." This was among Gypsies, where I acquired much skill in illusions, magic, ventriloquism, and other things. My reputation spread far and wide, for most people had never seen such amazing performances, including my beautiful voice. A fur trader talked about it to the Shah of Persia, who's little Sultana was dying of boredom. So he ordered the Persian to fetch me to him, which he did.
The Persian recalls my time of employment for the Shah-in-Shah of Persia as 'The Rosy Hours of Mazenderan,' because of the deaths of the many victims of the Shah and the 'little sultana' in the house of horrors that was the Shah's palace at Mazenderan. It was built in such a way that not even the slightest whisper could be considered private. The architecture was arranged so that sound carried and reverberated at myriad locations, so that one never knew who might be listening. The Persian does not go into great detail on the actual circumstances, dwelling instead on the vague horrors that existed at Mazenderan. The Shah became paranoid that I would use his genius against him and reveal the palaces' secrets to others, and ordered him executed. It was only by the intervention of the Persian (the 'daroga, or police chief of Mazenderan) and his friends, that I was able to escape.
I then went to Constantinople and was employed by its ruler at the time, helping build certain edifices in the Yildiz-Kiosk, among other things. But he had to leave there, as well, "for knowing too much".
I then wanted to live like everybody else, and for a time worked as a contractor, building "ordinary house with ordinary bricks". I eventually bid on a contract to help with the Palais Garnier, which I did.
I then decided to create a sort of playhouse for himself and live beneath the cellars, hiding from men's eyes for good. I had been composing "Don Juan Triumphant", a piece expressing every painful experience and emotion in the "abyss of the ugly man". I planned to go to his coffin-bed with it and "never wake up" after he was finished. This plan was seemingly before he found Christine. After I became infatuated with her, I had now told that my Don Juan was complete and I desperately longed to marry her and live a normal life.
I was now set in 19th century Paris at the Opera Garnier (The Paris Opera or The National Academy of Music), which was built between 1857 and 1874 over a huge underground lake. The employees claim that the opera house is haunted by a mysterious ghost who wreaks chaos and destruction when displeased. I, posing as the "Phantom of the Opera" (Opera Ghost in the Mattos and Bair translation), sends the managers of the Opera Garnier repeated threats of catastrophe should they not pay me a monthly stipend of 20,000 francs and perpetually reserve Box no.5 for me at every show. This arrangement, unbroken during the many years of the manager's tenure, is abruptly terminated when two new proprietors, Armand Moncharmin and Firmin Richard, take over the opera house and refuse to give in to what they view as the empty threats, originally thinking it a practical joke by former managers, and eventually growing suspicious of each other.
Meanwhile, I took on a new protegée, Christine Daaé. I tell her that am the "Angel of Music", a heavenly spirit sent by her dead father to help her, and proceeds to give her regular voice lessons through the wall. Under the tutelage of her new teacher, Christine makes rapid progress in her musical studies and achieves new prominence on stage when she is selected to replace the current prima donna Carlotta, whose act is sabotaged by the Phantom. Christine shines in her featured debut and immediately wins the hearts of the audience, including that of her childhood boyfriend, Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagny.
I became envious of Christine's relationship with Raoul and took her to his Gothic world beneath the opera house. Christine quickly finds that there is nothing angelic about me, and learns to her disappointment that I am just a man, and that I and the ghost are one and the same (and comes to know me as malicious, volatile, dangerous and somewhat bitter, yet also brilliant and pitiful). She is infuriated at having been deceived, and demands to be set free. I promise to release her after five days. After some awkward moments (dining by herself while he watches, being shown his room which looks like a death chamber, his bed a coffin...) I and Christine eventually begin a duet from Otello, and in a fit a of passion Christine rips off my mask, driven by curiosity to see the face of the man who loves her, and why I wear a mask. "If I live to be one hundred, I should always hear that superhuman cry of grief and rage which he uttered before that terrible sight reached my eyes," Christine later tells Raoul. The Phantom is furious and threatens to keep her in my lair forever, but later change my mind. Christine is released, but only after promising to return by her own will and swearing never to give her love to anyone else. Christine does return, but only out of pity for me.
But I am not the only one who is envious. After Christine's debut performance, Raoul overhears Christine succumbing to a tyrannical, disembodied voice in her dressing room. He becomes suspicious that another man is taking advantage of her innocent belief in an "Angel of Music" in order to seduce her. He starts spying on her in an attempt to find the mysterious seducer. Christine suddenly becomes aware of this and is very angry, but after I reveal himself, and with Raouls' persistence and threat not to leave on his naval expedition unless she tells him the truth (while promising to help her escape it), she decides to tell Raoul, on the roof of the Opera Garnier, everything that has happened between her and me. The two of them plan to run away from Paris and the "horror of me".
I overhear everything on the roof, and abduct Christine from the stage during her final performance at the Opera Garnier as Margarita in Gounod's Faust, at the point where Christine, as Margarita, is appealing to the angels. Raoul follows us down into the depths of the cavern beneath the opera house, and is guided to my house by a character known as the Persian. Unfortunately for both of them, the route they take to my house leads instead to a torture chamber, where they helplessly listen to me raging at Christine, who lied to me and betrayed me. I threaten that should Christine not marry him, I will destroy the Opera House with explosives, in turn, "many members of the human race" would be destroyed. Christine, already on the brink of suicide, sadly accepts my proposal at 11pm the next night, my 'deadline'.
Eventually, Christine shows me genuine sympathy and displays an act of love by letting me kiss her on the forehead; a loving act of normalcy that reduces me to sobbing at her feet ... having granted me a happiness I never thought possible. She cries with me, which makes me melt even more, as well as not running away when I takes off his mask, and actually taking my hand in compassion, saying "Poor unhappy Erik!" From all this, I had become "nothing more than a poor dog ready to die" for her. In tears of despair, I give Christine and Raoul his blessings to marry. I ask only that Christine come back after my death, and buries me with the ring I gave her, which occurs not long afterwards. She kisses my forehead before she leaves me. She becomes the only woman to have both let me kiss her, and who has kissed me, in contrast to my own mother, as I later explain to the Persian.
I returns the money to the managers, tie up all the loose ends, give the Persian (who once helped to save his life in Persia) instructions how to alert the two of my death, and dies. Christine keeps her promise and returns the ring.
"He had a heart that could have held the empire of the world, and in the end, he had to content himself with a cellar,"
The Persian recalls my time of employment for the Shah-in-Shah of Persia as 'The Rosy Hours of Mazenderan,' because of the deaths of the many victims of the Shah and the 'little sultana' in the house of horrors that was the Shah's palace at Mazenderan. It was built in such a way that not even the slightest whisper could be considered private. The architecture was arranged so that sound carried and reverberated at myriad locations, so that one never knew who might be listening. The Persian does not go into great detail on the actual circumstances, dwelling instead on the vague horrors that existed at Mazenderan. The Shah became paranoid that I would use his genius against him and reveal the palaces' secrets to others, and ordered him executed. It was only by the intervention of the Persian (the 'daroga, or police chief of Mazenderan) and his friends, that I was able to escape.
I then went to Constantinople and was employed by its ruler at the time, helping build certain edifices in the Yildiz-Kiosk, among other things. But he had to leave there, as well, "for knowing too much".
I then wanted to live like everybody else, and for a time worked as a contractor, building "ordinary house with ordinary bricks". I eventually bid on a contract to help with the Palais Garnier, which I did.
I then decided to create a sort of playhouse for himself and live beneath the cellars, hiding from men's eyes for good. I had been composing "Don Juan Triumphant", a piece expressing every painful experience and emotion in the "abyss of the ugly man". I planned to go to his coffin-bed with it and "never wake up" after he was finished. This plan was seemingly before he found Christine. After I became infatuated with her, I had now told that my Don Juan was complete and I desperately longed to marry her and live a normal life.
I was now set in 19th century Paris at the Opera Garnier (The Paris Opera or The National Academy of Music), which was built between 1857 and 1874 over a huge underground lake. The employees claim that the opera house is haunted by a mysterious ghost who wreaks chaos and destruction when displeased. I, posing as the "Phantom of the Opera" (Opera Ghost in the Mattos and Bair translation), sends the managers of the Opera Garnier repeated threats of catastrophe should they not pay me a monthly stipend of 20,000 francs and perpetually reserve Box no.5 for me at every show. This arrangement, unbroken during the many years of the manager's tenure, is abruptly terminated when two new proprietors, Armand Moncharmin and Firmin Richard, take over the opera house and refuse to give in to what they view as the empty threats, originally thinking it a practical joke by former managers, and eventually growing suspicious of each other.
Meanwhile, I took on a new protegée, Christine Daaé. I tell her that am the "Angel of Music", a heavenly spirit sent by her dead father to help her, and proceeds to give her regular voice lessons through the wall. Under the tutelage of her new teacher, Christine makes rapid progress in her musical studies and achieves new prominence on stage when she is selected to replace the current prima donna Carlotta, whose act is sabotaged by the Phantom. Christine shines in her featured debut and immediately wins the hearts of the audience, including that of her childhood boyfriend, Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagny.
I became envious of Christine's relationship with Raoul and took her to his Gothic world beneath the opera house. Christine quickly finds that there is nothing angelic about me, and learns to her disappointment that I am just a man, and that I and the ghost are one and the same (and comes to know me as malicious, volatile, dangerous and somewhat bitter, yet also brilliant and pitiful). She is infuriated at having been deceived, and demands to be set free. I promise to release her after five days. After some awkward moments (dining by herself while he watches, being shown his room which looks like a death chamber, his bed a coffin...) I and Christine eventually begin a duet from Otello, and in a fit a of passion Christine rips off my mask, driven by curiosity to see the face of the man who loves her, and why I wear a mask. "If I live to be one hundred, I should always hear that superhuman cry of grief and rage which he uttered before that terrible sight reached my eyes," Christine later tells Raoul. The Phantom is furious and threatens to keep her in my lair forever, but later change my mind. Christine is released, but only after promising to return by her own will and swearing never to give her love to anyone else. Christine does return, but only out of pity for me.
But I am not the only one who is envious. After Christine's debut performance, Raoul overhears Christine succumbing to a tyrannical, disembodied voice in her dressing room. He becomes suspicious that another man is taking advantage of her innocent belief in an "Angel of Music" in order to seduce her. He starts spying on her in an attempt to find the mysterious seducer. Christine suddenly becomes aware of this and is very angry, but after I reveal himself, and with Raouls' persistence and threat not to leave on his naval expedition unless she tells him the truth (while promising to help her escape it), she decides to tell Raoul, on the roof of the Opera Garnier, everything that has happened between her and me. The two of them plan to run away from Paris and the "horror of me".
I overhear everything on the roof, and abduct Christine from the stage during her final performance at the Opera Garnier as Margarita in Gounod's Faust, at the point where Christine, as Margarita, is appealing to the angels. Raoul follows us down into the depths of the cavern beneath the opera house, and is guided to my house by a character known as the Persian. Unfortunately for both of them, the route they take to my house leads instead to a torture chamber, where they helplessly listen to me raging at Christine, who lied to me and betrayed me. I threaten that should Christine not marry him, I will destroy the Opera House with explosives, in turn, "many members of the human race" would be destroyed. Christine, already on the brink of suicide, sadly accepts my proposal at 11pm the next night, my 'deadline'.
Eventually, Christine shows me genuine sympathy and displays an act of love by letting me kiss her on the forehead; a loving act of normalcy that reduces me to sobbing at her feet ... having granted me a happiness I never thought possible. She cries with me, which makes me melt even more, as well as not running away when I takes off his mask, and actually taking my hand in compassion, saying "Poor unhappy Erik!" From all this, I had become "nothing more than a poor dog ready to die" for her. In tears of despair, I give Christine and Raoul his blessings to marry. I ask only that Christine come back after my death, and buries me with the ring I gave her, which occurs not long afterwards. She kisses my forehead before she leaves me. She becomes the only woman to have both let me kiss her, and who has kissed me, in contrast to my own mother, as I later explain to the Persian.
I returns the money to the managers, tie up all the loose ends, give the Persian (who once helped to save his life in Persia) instructions how to alert the two of my death, and dies. Christine keeps her promise and returns the ring.
"He had a heart that could have held the empire of the world, and in the end, he had to content himself with a cellar,"