Orpheus in the Underworld Orpheus in the Underworld Orphée aux enfers, whose title translates from the French as Orpheus in the Underworld, is an opéra bouffon (a form of operetta), or opéra féerie in its revised version. Its score was composed by Jacques Offenbach to a French text written by Ludovic Halévy and later revised by Hector-Jonathan Crémieux. The work, first performed in 1858, is said to be the first classical full-length operetta. Offenbach's earlier operettas were small-scale one-act works, since the law in France did not allow full-length works of certain genres. "Orpheus" was not only longer, but more musically adventurous than Offenbach's
The Lyre of Orpheus (novel) The Lyre of Orpheus (novel) The Lyre of Orpheus, first published by Macmillan of Canada in 1988, is the last of the three connected novels of the "Cornish Trilogy" by Canadian novelist Robertson Davies. It was preceded by "The Rebel Angels" (1981) and "What's Bred in the Bone" (1985). In "The Lyre of Orpheus", the executors of the will of Francis Cornish (the subject of "What's Bred in the Bone") find themselves at the head of the "Cornish Foundation". The 5 directors of the Foundation, the 3 remaining Frank Cornish's estate executors, being Professor the Reverend Simon Darcourt, Arthur Cornish,