Aus einem Totenhaus
Sunday 03.06.2018, 18:00-19:35

„The House of the Dead“ – the moniker accorded to the Siberian labour camp by those held within it: thieves, killers, political prisoners.

This is a place in which captives are incessantly monitored and punished. With its very own rules involving power and submission; its hierarchies and bullying by those in authority; this is a place far from civilisation, which acts both as its blind spot and its mirror. Based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novel The House of the Dead, in which the author processes his own four-year incarceration, Leoš Janáček created a singular work of musical theatre. This is an opera without heroes; without the standard plot revolving around conflict and its subsequent resolution. Against a backdrop of the tedium and gruelling routine of camp life, Janáček allows individual prisoners and their stories to emerge briefly from the multitude. He draws out personal journeys marked by humiliation and abuse. Janáček’s unique musical idiom feels like eavesdropping and provides a raw, gestural expression for the brutality faced in the camp, but also for the moments of shared hope, compassion and solidarity.

text: Bayerische Staatsoper



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: Bayerischer Staatsoper