Oh, this is fantastic, thank you for giving me the flip perspective on this! I also realized after reading your comment that (in addition to reading in random translation, of course) I'm doing the play a grave disservice by talking about it after reading it rather than watching it, vs. having actually watched the opera -- I've definitely had my opinion about plays (and operas) changed substantially by watching them, and in almost all cases I like them better after watching them (unless it's a really odd staging or something). The fact that I like it as much as I do after only reading it in not-so-great translation should count for a lot more than I'm giving it proper credit for. I'm really annoyed now that it's never performed here and there doesn't seem to be any way I know of to get access to a performance in any kind of translation -- if you know of any (I would be willing to spend money on this) I would love to know!
I also started thinking about what I'd think if some random non-English speaker said, "Yeah, you know, that Macbeth play is all right, but there's a reason why it's the Verdi opera that everyone knows about!" I would certainly have some opinions about how that person was Missing Some Context, and how in English it's a far different experience, and of course the play is better. So -- thank you for being so gracious about it :) (Although, to be fair, especially for a non-English speaker, I could see thinking the opera was better there too, for similar reasons -- Verdi, gosh, he's so brilliant, and there are these emotional truths that I think music just is really good at getting at, even though you have to dial down the story complexity and, to be honest, introduce some nonsensical bits as a result sometimes.)
My utter adoration for opera!Rodrigo (and liking Schiller's Posa less) has as its root that one of my pieces of kryptonite is friendship and loyalty and competence kink, plus which I tend not to like plots where everything could be easily resolved if people just talked to one another, so, there you can see why Schiller's Posa bothers me :) But I can see, if I'd come to manipulative!Posa first, missing that in opera!Rodrigo, who is much simpler.
Okay, I must admit that I am a total Philistine and don't do well with monologues (or solo arias) in general :) (For similar reasons, I think, I also have a hard time with podcasts and audiobooks.) I was actually thinking about the experience of listening to a monologue as long as Posa's, and realizing that I'd probably just tune out entirely. (It's much less bothersome in text.) So -- that's a me thing :)
the conflict becomes whether he should have killed Posa himself or given him to the Inquisition
Yeah, sorry, I wasn't at all clear there -- this isn't, as you say, at all what the scene is about -- I did get that thematically it's about the church vs. state (and it is in the opera as well) -- but not delivering Posa to the Inquisition (I think! Unless I'm missing something?) is the specific point of contention through which this conflict is mediated. Although I had not realized that it directly relates to delivering Carlos to the Inquisition as well.
whether Philip himself has retained/can retain a part of humanity not subject to the state/church. Delivering Carlos to the Inquisition at the end is the direct answer to this question.
...wait, I think I'm confused here. It seemed to me that before Philip met with the Inquisitor he had already determined to destroy Carlos, and delivering Carlos to the Inquisition is only the means to that end. On rereading I guess it's not entirely clear whether Philip had fully determined to kill him yet -- but it does seem to me that in this part of the scene the Inquisitor is there to justify Philip's terrible decisions, rather than to get Philip to subject himself to the church. (Though all of that was present in spades in the Posa part of the conversation, which does read to me like Philip slowly losing whatever part of humanity he still had to knuckling down to the church.)
Ah, yes, I totally buy Don Carlos as the tragedy of Philip -- in fact, in the opera I feel like Filippo is the only one who actually has the chance, the possibility, to make decisions that can actually change the tragic outcome (whereas Carlo, Rodrigo, and Elisabetta are mostly carried along by the actions and their character-driven inevitable responses) -- but then he doesn't. In the play (although Carlos and Elisabeth turn out to be similarly powerless to affect things much, sadly) I got much more of a sense of Roderigo also having the chance to make decisions, and also I felt like until late in the play he was rather more central than Philip, which is why it didn't ping me as hard -- but then there's that marvelous scene after Roderigo's death where Philip does make that conscious turn to become the villain (when he could have become the hero), and then of course he's the one who closes the play out. Interestingly, I had read that as almost inevitable, given Posa's betrayal (...I think I'm just really emotional about Posa, okay) -- but of course it's not; of course he could also have chosen to retain that feeling of wanting to be more worthy of Posa... hmm.
AGH that opera supernatural ending. That is something I dislike about the opera, and I was shocked upon reading Schiller to find that it's not in the source material at all and that there's a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why someone is creeping around looking like the old emperor :) I got nothing, except that maybe that they wanted Filippo to feel bad about what he's just done (although, I mean, it's Carlos who gets dragged away, after all, not Philip, so that doesn't necessarily make sense either). I guess they wanted plausible deniability for fic writers to write post-canon fic that isn't 100% terrible for Elisabetta not that I am thinking about this
gah, now I want complicated messy complex-character Schiller fic about what Rodrigo thinks of when Carlos got whipped for him (I mean, he must have had serious mixed feelings about that) and Rodrigo and Elisabeth teaming up to foil minor Philip plans pre-play and Eboli and Philip interaction and... :P *makes note for Yuletide*
no subject
I also started thinking about what I'd think if some random non-English speaker said, "Yeah, you know, that Macbeth play is all right, but there's a reason why it's the Verdi opera that everyone knows about!" I would certainly have some opinions about how that person was Missing Some Context, and how in English it's a far different experience, and of course the play is better. So -- thank you for being so gracious about it :) (Although, to be fair, especially for a non-English speaker, I could see thinking the opera was better there too, for similar reasons -- Verdi, gosh, he's so brilliant, and there are these emotional truths that I think music just is really good at getting at, even though you have to dial down the story complexity and, to be honest, introduce some nonsensical bits as a result sometimes.)
My utter adoration for opera!Rodrigo (and liking Schiller's Posa less) has as its root that one of my pieces of kryptonite is friendship and loyalty and competence kink, plus which I tend not to like plots where everything could be easily resolved if people just talked to one another, so, there you can see why Schiller's Posa bothers me :) But I can see, if I'd come to manipulative!Posa first, missing that in opera!Rodrigo, who is much simpler.
Okay, I must admit that I am a total Philistine and don't do well with monologues (or solo arias) in general :) (For similar reasons, I think, I also have a hard time with podcasts and audiobooks.) I was actually thinking about the experience of listening to a monologue as long as Posa's, and realizing that I'd probably just tune out entirely. (It's much less bothersome in text.) So -- that's a me thing :)
the conflict becomes whether he should have killed Posa himself or given him to the Inquisition
Yeah, sorry, I wasn't at all clear there -- this isn't, as you say, at all what the scene is about -- I did get that thematically it's about the church vs. state (and it is in the opera as well) -- but not delivering Posa to the Inquisition (I think! Unless I'm missing something?) is the specific point of contention through which this conflict is mediated. Although I had not realized that it directly relates to delivering Carlos to the Inquisition as well.
whether Philip himself has retained/can retain a part of humanity not subject to the state/church. Delivering Carlos to the Inquisition at the end is the direct answer to this question.
...wait, I think I'm confused here. It seemed to me that before Philip met with the Inquisitor he had already determined to destroy Carlos, and delivering Carlos to the Inquisition is only the means to that end. On rereading I guess it's not entirely clear whether Philip had fully determined to kill him yet -- but it does seem to me that in this part of the scene the Inquisitor is there to justify Philip's terrible decisions, rather than to get Philip to subject himself to the church. (Though all of that was present in spades in the Posa part of the conversation, which does read to me like Philip slowly losing whatever part of humanity he still had to knuckling down to the church.)
Ah, yes, I totally buy Don Carlos as the tragedy of Philip -- in fact, in the opera I feel like Filippo is the only one who actually has the chance, the possibility, to make decisions that can actually change the tragic outcome (whereas Carlo, Rodrigo, and Elisabetta are mostly carried along by the actions and their character-driven inevitable responses) -- but then he doesn't. In the play (although Carlos and Elisabeth turn out to be similarly powerless to affect things much, sadly) I got much more of a sense of Roderigo also having the chance to make decisions, and also I felt like until late in the play he was rather more central than Philip, which is why it didn't ping me as hard -- but then there's that marvelous scene after Roderigo's death where Philip does make that conscious turn to become the villain (when he could have become the hero), and then of course he's the one who closes the play out. Interestingly, I had read that as almost inevitable, given Posa's betrayal (...I think I'm just really emotional about Posa, okay) -- but of course it's not; of course he could also have chosen to retain that feeling of wanting to be more worthy of Posa... hmm.
AGH that opera supernatural ending. That is something I dislike about the opera, and I was shocked upon reading Schiller to find that it's not in the source material at all and that there's a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why someone is creeping around looking like the old emperor :) I got nothing, except that maybe that they wanted Filippo to feel bad about what he's just done (although, I mean, it's Carlos who gets dragged away, after all, not Philip, so that doesn't necessarily make sense either).
I guess they wanted plausible deniability for fic writers to write post-canon fic that isn't 100% terrible for Elisabetta not that I am thinking about thisgah, now I want complicated messy complex-character Schiller fic about what Rodrigo thinks of when Carlos got whipped for him (I mean, he must have had serious mixed feelings about that) and Rodrigo and Elisabeth teaming up to foil minor Philip plans pre-play and Eboli and Philip interaction and... :P *makes note for Yuletide*