A large proportion of the English drive themselves mad with a baroque cocktail of fury, snobbery and self-hatred over Gilbert and Sullivan

Robert Thicknesse on the woes of modern, British opera

The V&A reckons Alice in Wonderland is a self-help manual in the sex-war rather than the daydreams of an old Oxford perv

Robert Thicknesse ruminates on The Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko

Robert Thicknesse on Rossini’s extraordinary de-cluttering of the musical atmosphere

Robert Thicknesse on how the idea that foreign poetry was better than local soon became established dogma

Robert Thicknesse reveals how in searching for meaning, opera adaptations are becoming more obscure

La Clemenza di Tito, Geneva

People are terrified of modernity’s great gift: the sudden freedom to make appalling noise, says Robert Thicknesse

Opera unswervingly believes in the potential for a divine spark in humans, says Robert Thicknesse