Music, Theatre, and Diplomacy: The Paris Opera during the Second Empire

One of the first accomplishments of the Second Empire (1852-70) was to bring the Opera under the control of a committee of the most highly placed politicians in the land. While this had far-reaching consequences for the development of repertory in the capital and beyond, it also opened up the possibility of using the Opera as a locus of diplomatic activity, and major works and productions were made to work for diplomatic purposes. The Opera emerged as a site of four types of diplomatic activities: the spectacle of state visits, the celebration and monumentalizing of military victories, the restoration and maintenance of good relations, and the promotion of Napoleon's imperial project. Occasionally, as at the end of the "Crimean war," the Opera served as one of the sites for a series of prolonged negotiations that would lead to formal treaties.