The Immortal Hour The Immortal Hour The Immortal Hour is an opera by English composer Rutland Boughton. Boughton adapted his own libretto from the play of the same name by Fiona MacLeod, a pseudonym of writer William Sharp. "The Immortal Hour" is a fairy tale or fairy opera, with a mood and theme similar to Dvořák's "Rusalka" and Mozart's "The Magic Flute". Magic and nature spirits play important roles in the storyline. The fairy people are not mischievous, childlike sprites, but are proud and powerful: immortal demigods who are feared by mortals and who can (and do) interfere with the lives of men
Libretto of The Magic Flute libretto attracted the admiration of Franz Liszt, who after attending a performance copied down several of them in a personal letter. Ingmar Bergman in his 1975 film of the opera gave special treatment to the didactic poetry by having his characters hoist "a series of placards on which these moral sentiments are carefully lettered." The passage quoted above beginning "Zwei Herzen" has attracted particular admiration: Heartz called it "the loveliest of all the opera's beautiful moments"; Abert wrote of "a paradisal radiance unique in this work". Liszt quoted Schikaneder's verse in his letter and appended, "Amen!". A matter that perturbs