The Magic Flute libretto was Masonic in nature.
MAB - As I understand it, the libretto (book or score) of the Magic Flute was based on Masonic principles and was written mainly by Emmanuel Shikaneder, the empressario of the opera company which put on the opera. He was an old friend of Mozart's and hired him to write the music.
Shikaneder, Mozart and many others involved in the production were Masons and Masonic teachings had much to do with the story. Mozart was not a key contributor to the score.
As for Mozart being sexist, I do not know. There was no such thing as "Women's Lib" in 18th Century Vienna as far as I know. Men were men and women were women. Women did not have the opportunities men did in those days. Mozart's siister, Nanerl, is a prime example. She was just as skilled as he was as a pianist and she also showed compositional brilliance in her youth but she was not encouraged to pursue her compositional talents by her Father, in fact, quite the opposite, she was discouraged from composing. Women were encouraged to sing and play the piano but composing was a field which they were encouraged to stay out of.
Mozart loved his wife Constance, very much. The couple spawned 6 children in their marriage of just under 10 years (only 2 of them lived to be adults). Constance became ill in 1789 when she was still in her twenties. Wolfgang paid large sums of money for her to stay at the nearby spa, Baden, and take expensive healing treatments there. Those expenditures contributed heavily towards his getting into debt. He took Constance with him on his final trip to Prague just 3 months before he died. She took the score of the Requiem Mass away from him during his final illness, thinking that it was contributing to his thoughts of dying.
Mozart worked with many extremely attractive opera divas during his married life, one being Nancy Storace of England, and also had some very attractive female piano pupils. Rumors abound that he had affairs with some of them but there is no proof whatever that this occurred.
Just accusing someone from the late 18th century of being sexist is a cheap shot. Probably the majority of men at that time held attitudes regarding women that would be considered sexist today. So what! Probably most women of that time held the same attitudes. Women of that time did not want to be fireman or to compete with men as business executives. It just was not possible for those types of things to occur in that period, 250 years ago.
Lakey
the pair though!
EP
