This volume is set in a typical, old Beijing teahouse. Lao She's drama follows the lives of the owner and his customers through three stages in modern Chinese history. The play spans fifty years and has a cast of over sixty characters drawn from all levels of society. Brought together in Yutai Teahouse, they reflect, through the changes that were taking place in Chinese society.
Marking the centenary of Tchaikovsky's death and the upsurge of interest in his music, this study assesses the operas, ballets and other works against the background of the composer's eventful life: his ill-judged marriage, his pen- friendship with his patron Nadezhda von Meck, and his relationship with Balakirev and other Russian composers.
„Peter Tschaikowsky ist der berühmteste Komponist des alten Rußlands. Mit einer detaillierten Werkanalyse verknüpft Garden die farbige Schilderung des unruhigen Musikerlebens; präzise aufgehellt werden auch die Hintergründe von Tschaikowskys erzwungenem Selbstmord.“