I've seen, quite a few times now, people saying that Erik in Phantom of the Opera is weird cuz he like "groomed" Christine. And acting like it took years.
CANONICALLY that's Not true. Like, what version are y'all reading? I've read the De Mattos & Ribiere translations. In Both of those, he's known Christine for months. 6-9 MAX.
He didn't get her while she was underage/in school. And he didn't go into this looking for a relationship. There's actually no fucking evidence of that anywhere in Leroux's novel (unless you know something from like the original French novel that's not in any of the translations that I have)
Her father died, Madame Valerius put her into the Paris conservatoire, she got accepted into the Opera Garnier.
She admits that she'd lost herself after her father's death. Raoul says that at the conservatoire she was like a souless, singing automaton. The ballet girls point out that a few months ago she was bleating.
Christine is NEW at the Opera. She's not some longstanding primadonna like Carlotta. She's like freshly 20yo.
Erik doesn't even call himself the Angel of Music until SHE asks if he is.
He just asks if she'll allow him to teach her.
Obviously Erik saw a sad, lonely new girl and offered help.
He goes quiet the day she mentions Raoul because I think it hits him that he's developed feelings. He comes back the next day and tells her that he can't keep teaching her if she's in love with someone else. He admits after he kidnaps her the 1st time that he fell in love with her.
Before that, he was fully committed to living his life in isolation, mildly harassing the directors and working on Don Juan. His PLAN was to finish it, lay down in the coffin and die, NOT to kidnap anyone or get married.
Did he manipulate her, yes? But grooming?
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