PRINT PRODUCTS
Featuring works by Derek Strahan & various Australian Poets
"EDEN IN ATLANTIS" -
Libretto for an original opera for multimedia
by Derek Strahan - 3rd draft, written in April/May 2001.
This is the first of an intended 4 opera cycle on the subject of high civilisations of pre-history, and their ultimate destruction by global cataclysm, a subject suggested by reading a wide range of literature on the subject: folklore in secular and religious traditions, historical references in classical literature, modern commentaries from the late 19th century to the present day, and conjectural reconstructions of ancient history. It is intended for production both for stage and for screen.
This work is a re-studying of the Genesis story, in which the Golden Age of antiquity is presumed to have occurred in a geologically different earth whose ideal climatic conditions were ended by a cataclysm which predated the Great Flood. The principal characters of the Genesis story all appear in refracted forms. Click here to access greater detail on this, and to read excerpts.
This print product provides the opportunity to read a work in an intermediate stage of evolution. At 24,000 words of text, it is the right length for a play (and could be produced as such, as it stands) but is about 10,000 words too long for an opera libretto! To produce a libretto of the same length as Wagner's "Gotterdammerung" approx 135 words per page will have to be deleted! This work of editing may only be done in conjunction with composition of the full music score. In the meantime, the writer offers the 3rd draft in a limited, signed edition, as a collector's item.
10 introductory pages of commentary, explanation and cast details, and 74 pages of dramatic text, A4 double-sided, plastic coil binding.
"TAKEOVER" - Libretto for an original opera for
multimedia
by Derek Strahan - 1st draft, written in 1989.
The story concerns a love triangle between Anna, and two businessmen, Bernard, who represents old money, and Ivan, who represents new money. Each approach Anna with the assumption that wealth will allow him to effect a "takeover" of her. Anna herself, is ambivalent about each man, and is also ambivalent about herself. if she chose, she could succeed as a singer, but she is attracted to the luxury which wealth provides. A composer, John, who is also in love with her, tries to persuade her to express herself through her talent, but he is only the man she turns to when others fail her. A crisis in her personal life coincides with a stock market crash, which affects, in varying degrees, the financial power of the men bidding to "takeover" her.
Finally, Anna rejects all the men, and decides to capitalise on her beauty by becoming a highly paid sex worker. This leads to a situation in which her life is endangered.
This 1st draft comprises text encompassing passages to be sung and passages to be spoken. It has the structure of a 'singspiel', or an operetta; in content it combines social irony with romantic passion.
5 introductory pages of commentary and cast details, and 89 pages of dramatic text, A4 double-sided, plastic coil binding.
"PUBLIC POETRY
ANTHOLOGY - VOLUME ONE"
A limited edition volume published in 1990 containing verse by 21 Australian writers and collected at a time when they were gathering at weekly meetings to give readings of their work, at Watsons Bay, in Sydney's Eastern suburbs. A wide variety of styles are manifest, with insights from both genders on matters of identity, time, place, sex, cooking and biology, and sundry problems including "when biomass becomes biomess" (to quote from Renee Brack's "Landscape Goat - The Survivalist's Song to the Body of Her Son")
Also featured, among others, are Jenny Hunter Brown, David Barda, Marlene Simons, Derek Strahan, Daniel Debs, Renee Martin, Haron Moses, Amanda Nicholson, Simon Lenthen, Marcelle Freiman, Christopher Hallett, Susan Wildman, David O'Brien.
Derek Strahan's contributions are also intended as song libretti. Click here to read extracts.
Paperback, 137 pages, (C) by Public Poetry, Crucible Books, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, All rights revert to authors upon publication. National Library of Australia card number and ISBN 0 949911 02 X
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All images and text within this site are copyright protected 1997 Derek Strahan dstrahan@revolve.com.au