- Die Tote Stadt (‘The Dead City’)
The action of Die tote Stadt takes place in Bruges at the end of the 19th century. In Act 1 Paul (tenor) mourns the death of his young wife Marie. The decaying city is a constant reminder to him both of her and of the past, and in a room in his house he keeps a ‘temple of memories’, a museum of all the objects that remind him of her, the most precious of which is a braid of her golden hair. Paul’s friend Frank (baritone) arrives to find him in an excited state; he has recently met a woman who bears a striking resemblance to Marie, and now he has invited her to his house so that he can see her walk through his wife’s room, thereby returning death to life. Eventually the woman, a dancer called Marietta (soprano), arrives. She so arouses Paul’s passions that he tries to embrace her. As she pulls away she uncovers a picture of Marie, and is surprised to see what appears to be a portrait of herself. But it is time for her to go to a rehearsal; she is playing Hélène in Meyerbeer’s Robert le diable. Paul stays behind, and as he wrestles with the contradicting emotions of loyalty to his dead wife and desire for Marietta, he witnesses an apparition: Marie (her part taken by the same singer as Marietta) steps from her portrait, and as she tells him to live his own life she is transformed into the dancing figure of Marietta.
Act 2 takes place a few weeks later. Paul’s vision is continuing; he imagines himself outside Marietta’s house, tormented by guilt and inner turmoil. He sees Brigitta, his housekeeper (contralto) – who has left him because of his infidelity to Marie’s memory – and falls out with Frank, who has also succumbed to Marietta’s charms. Marietta and her friends now approach and, watched from hiding by Paul, rehearse Hélène’s scene from Robert le diable. As Marietta acts out Hélène’s rise from the tomb, Paul rushes forward, outraged at this mockery of resurrection. She sends her friends away, and he hurls accusations at her, telling her that the strength of his passion was only because in her he saw his dead wife. Marietta decides to confront the challenge of her dead rival, and again seduces Paul. She suggests that they spend the night at his house, there to banish the ghost for ever.
Act 3 opens in Marie’s room. It is the following morning, and Marietta is standing triumphantly in front of Marie’s portrait. A holy procession is passing and Marietta and Paul watch it from the window. Paul is absorbed in the ceremony, and when the bishop appears he falls to his knees. Marietta, disgusted by Paul’s piety, decides to test it against her erotic powers. She insists that Paul kiss her but he refuses and the two of them begin to argue, Paul defending his faith in loyalty and Marietta accusing him of hypocrisy and weakness. She taunts him with her dancing, and when she mockingly drapes the lock of Marie’s hair around her neck, Paul strangles her. Now she is exactly like Marie. At this point the vision ends. Paul awakes and sees the lock of hair untouched. The housekeeper announces that the lady who visited him, Marietta, has returned for her umbrella and roses. Marietta enters, but to her suggestion that this is an omen for her to stay Paul says nothing; he has been disillusioned by his dream. Marietta shrugs her shoulders and leaves, and Paul decides to leave Bruges, the city of death. The past cannot be recaptured, and those who have departed cannot be brought back.
a reader