Older and wiser: an opera for middle age

Der Rosenkavalier is best savoured when life has taught you about regretThere's a school of thought that certain works of art are best appreciated at certain ages: DH Lawrence, I've always thought, is best read in the late teens. Other works of literature accompany you through life, one's reading of them changing as you get older. I re-read Jane Austen most years. Her heroines, once unattainably grown-up, are now slips-of-girls to me, and I'm more sympathetic to her older, less manifestly attrac...

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