Harem of European women forcibly taken into Oriental harems—evident for example in the Mozart opera "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abduction from the Seraglio") concerning the attempt of the hero Belmonte to rescue his beloved Konstanze from the "seraglio"/harem of the Pasha Selim; or in Voltaire's "Candide", in chapter 12 of which the old woman relates her experiences of being sold into harems across the Ottoman Empire. Much of Verdi's opera "Il corsaro" takes place in the harem of the Pasha Seid—where Gulnara, the Pasha's favorite, chafes at life in the harem, and longs for freedom and true love. Eventually
Vladimir Rosing he directed "Tosca", "The Barber of Seville", and "Faust" in 1947 with an up-and-coming young bass named Jerome Hines. In 1948 the National Opera Association of Los Angeles, under his direction, presented "The Beggar's Opera", "The Abduction from the Seraglio", "Pagliacci", "Rigoletto", "Faust", and "La traviata" with soprano Jean Fenn. Productions of "The Marriage of Figaro", "The Queen of Spades", and "Don Giovanni" with the American Opera Company of Los Angeles completed 1948. For KFI-TV in 1949 Rosing presented 46 weeks of live televised opera sequences on Sunday afternoons which were voted Outstanding Musical Program of Local Origin by the