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Allusions And Historical Models In Gaston Leroux's The Phantom Of The Opera, Joy A. Mills

Honors Theses

Gaston Leroux's 1911 novel, The Phantom of the Opera, has a considerable number of allusions, some of which are accessible to modern American audiences, like references to Romeo and Juliet. Many of the references, however, are very specific to the operatic world or to other somewhat obscure fields. Knowledge of these allusions would greatly enhance the experience of readers of the novel, and would also contribute to their ability to interpret it. Thus my thesis aims to be helpful to those who read The Phantom of the Opera by providing a set of notes, as it were, …