Lord Dunsany Review: The Doom of La Traviata

After La Traviata died near the Moulin Rouge, God judged her soul wanting and cast her to Hell. However, the angels felt pity on her and left her in the road before Hell. This proved less of a blessing than anticipated as her soul grew into a huge pink flower with lidless eyes. So close to Hell, she withered but could never die.

God went Old Testament on the disobedient angels: “the Lord arose with His sword, and scattered His disobedient angels as a thresher scatters chaff.”

Well, that was dreary compared to most of Dunsany’s work. What happened?

Was it a morality tale, warning against the wages of sin? A satire of religious beliefs?

As I was wondering, somewhere in my dim mind, a synapse clicked, linking “La Traviata” with opera. I Googled and, yes, it’s the name of one of the most popular operas of all time. (I can immediately recognize the names of minor superheroes from the Silver Age and directors of 1950s monster movies, but classy subjects are a mystery.)

Is there a connection between Dunsany’s story and the opera??

I have no idea. Was this what fanfiction looked like in 1909? Did the damned soul belong to the protagonist of the opera who died in the end?

Apparently this is a subject so obscure that not only does it not appear on the internet but there exists no porn based on it either–take that Rule 34!

I think Lord Dunsany was referencing topical events of the time. Much like some of the humor of the recent Algernon Blackwood stories that I posted about, the sources faded, leaving future readers baffled.

In high culture, I know many of the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch contain depictions that referred to Dutch idioms of the late 1400s/early 1500s that no one understands today.

In my level of culture, as I got older, it became more and more frequent that Weird Al would parody a song I’d never heard before. Most were still funny but didn’t entirely make sense and I felt I was missing something. “The Doom of La Traviata” reminded me of that.

Opera lovers might respond better to this story–I imagine they would know if there was a connection or not. “The Doom of La Traviata” was oddly whimsical for a story about damnation. One of its greatest appeals is to see how strange it is.