Adaptation, deviations and disruptions. The becoming-opera of The Handmaid’s Tale by Paul Bentley
In 2022, the English National Opera presented a new production of Poul Ruders’ opera adapted from The Handmaid’s Tale, a novel whose plot is based on the totalitarian outcome of a utopian project gone awry. This paper addresses the (non)compliance with rules that can be traced in the intermedial metamorphoses that occurred in the genesis of the work, as recounted by its librettist, Paul Bentley, in a somewhat irreverent book unveiling the mysteries of creation, when literature and music interrelate.