What is The Nose (opera)?
{{italictitle}} '''''The Nose''''' is an [[opera]] by [[Dmitri Shostakovich]]. It was written in [[1927]]. At this time a lot of exciting new [[movies]] were being made in the [[Soviet Union]]. There were also some very interesting new [[Play (theatre)|plays]] in the [[theatre]]s. The famous theatre director [[Vsevolod Meyerhold]] had many new ideas. However, operas that were being written then were mostly quite uninteresting. Shostakovich, who was only just twenty years old, started to make Soviet operas interesting again. He took the story called ''The Nose'' which was written by [[Nikolai Gogol]]. It is about a man who wakes up one day to find his [[nose]] has gone. The opera was first performed in [[1930]]. Unfortunately by then the [[music critic]]s had changed their ideas because of the political situation in the Soviet Union which was being ruled by the [[dictator]] [[Stalin]]. They wrote bad things about the opera and the performances soon had to stop. It was not until [[1974]] that it was performed again in the Soviet Union. The opera is a [[satire]]. It pokes fun at [[bureaucrat]]s: people in official jobs who think they are more important than they really are. ==The story of the opera== In the opera the [[barber]] Ivan Yakovlevich is seen shaving the Major. In the morning Ivan wakes up and his wife gives him some fresh [[bread]] and [[onion]]. When he cuts the bread open he finds a nose inside. His wife screams and yells at her husband. She chases him out of the house. He runs along the [[street]] with the nose, feeling very embarrassed. He throws the nose in the [[river]], but a [[policeman]] catches him. He tries unsuccessfully to [[bribe]] him. In the next scene the Major wakes up and finds he has no nose. He goes to tell the [[police]]. He goes to the [[cathedral]] and sees his nose who is dressed up as an important person (the nose is now a person, sung by a singer). The Major is not sure what to say to his nose because his nose is now more important than he is. He