Time of Confusion

Several years ago, I read a book I wanted to keep for future reference, but as is often happens after praising it so much I had to lend it to someone and never got it back. The book was The Vertigo Years: Europe 1900-1914, by Philipp Blom. I bought it because a chapter titled Wagner's Crime grabbed my attention and in my typical fashion I did not realize until later that Richard Wagner had long been dead in 1900. Nevertheless, the book was fascinating and I wish I still had it. Maybe it would help clarify my current thoughts and give me a hint on how best to proceed in this century. 

The Vertigo Years is about fast changes - scientific, technological, political and societal - that left many people confused in the early years of the 20th century. In the West, machines increasingly replaced manpower, motorcars replaced horse-drawn carriages, and movies became a popular form of entertainment while the Bolshevik Revolution was brewing in the East. Life became faster and more complex causing  a lot of stress. More and more patients were diagnosed with a nervous disorder called neurasthenia. With the advent of women's movements, communism, technological developments and other threats to the established order in Europe, many men felt insecure and so they put on uniforms, grew moustaches and engaged in duels and similar "manly" pursuits. The author (as far as I can remember) said much of the confusion stemmed from the conflicting approaches to the new century. Half of the western population believed that a new century must usher a new era, and the other half (or three-qarter?) wanted to cling to the old and familiar.

The Gaumont Palace in Paris was the largest movie theater in Europe in the early 20th century

It seems to me that the world has arrived at a similar point in the early decades of this century. Aren't recent political developments worldwide, not to mention at home, a clear indication that half of the world is not sure it wants to get ahead, and prefers to take a step back. Just look at the Polish events this weekend: the marchers, apparently quite young, want a return to white, Catholic and conservative Poland. One can only hope that it is the kind of step back that gives impetus to a big jump forward.
 
There are other comparisons between the early 20th and the early 21st centuries. Silently the family, at least in the United States, stopped consisting of a man, a woman and several kids. Traditionalists watch in horror the crumbling of the established boundaries as same-sex marriages become legal, gender issues include transgender issues, populations become diverse. The more changes are pushed in from one side, the more resistance builds up on the other. You can see semi-nude bodies in public places along with those covered from head to toe. Digital technology is developing at such a vertiginous speed that while you still struggle to learn the ropes on iPhone 6, the new cell-phones are light years ahead. It has come to the point when even a libertarian and "futurist" like me cannot digest it all. I stubbornly refuse to use Siri because it may give me more headache. Of course, it is questionable that Siri would understand my accent.

A hundred years ago, women in England demonstrated for the right to vote. A century later, women in several countries donned pink hats to demonstrate against all kinds of injustices. They were not stoned or jailed , but the recent Weinstein hoopla revealed how much women have been discouraged from seeking justice even in the 21st century, and not only by men but by their whole societies. A woman in Croatia, I learn, has tried to report her husband's sexual abuse of their daughter only to be told by the police that they can't intervene in family disputes. When the daughter got pregnant a couple of times and the case could not be covered up any longer, the husband was jailed, but the woman was ostracized by her community for "not having done enough", for "not having left the man immediately" and all kinds of other "wrongs." People were angry at the uncomfortable situation in their midst and the victim was easier to blame than the perpetrator. 

The wife of French President Emmanuel Macron has had to cope with a wave of misogyny for being 24 years older than the husband

Neurasthenia is no longer officially listed as a disease in the United States (as it is in some other countries), but there are all kinds of other nervous and autoimmune disorders with similar symptoms and blamed on similar causes.

The Vertigo Years is divided into 15 chapters, one for each year leading to World War One. But instead of giving us a boring history lesson for the year, Blom picked an important event in each year that was new and significant not only for the era but for the future too.

The last chapter titled Murder Most Foul, was about 1914, the year of the start of the Great War. So it can only be about the assassination of the Austrian archduke in Sarajevo, right? Well .....not actually. It is about the sensational murder committed by the wife of a French politician. Henriette Caillaux shot to death the editor of Le Figaro who was critical of her husband. If she had not done it, her husband would have been forced to challenge him to a duel that would end his political career. She was acquitted after her lawyer persuaded the jury that the wealthy socialite had not premeditated the murder, but committed a crime of passion, caused by her "uncontrollable female passions." Never mind that Henriette sat for an hour in Le Figaro offices waiting for the editor to come in. Female passions take much longer to cool down.

The second murder most foul that year sparked the biggest war in the history of the time.  Let's hope our "vertigo years" don't bring another more destructive one.

P.S. Just in case you wondered: Wagner's Crime, as indicated earlier, was not a chapter about one of my favorite composers, but a story about a provincial Austrian teacher who unexpectedly and inexplicably murdered his wife and children after having a pleasant meal at a local inn and chatting amiably with neighbors all the way home. It was the first court case ever in which insanity was accepted as reason for acquittal and Wagner spent the rest of his life in an asylum. Today, insanity seems to be a new normal so such acquittals may be harder to win, and there aren't enough asylums to keep all the afflicted in.

Tristan und Isolde by Mariusz Treliński

Mariusz Treliński was movie-star good looking when I met him in the Kennedy Center foyer ahead of his first U.S. appearance in 2001. The acclaimed Polish film director had attracted the attention of then-Washington Opera director Placido Domingo with his innovative production of Puccini's Madama Butterfly in Poland and Domingo invited him to stage it in the U.S. That event changed Treliński's life forever. Since then he has directed operas in several major U.S. cities, and many others in various countries. His operatic journey has culminated with the production of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde for the opening of the Metropolitan Opera's new season.

Treliński's Butterfly was the first truly exciting opera production I had seen in Washington and, I thought, one with uniquely central European uncluttered esthetic. Although it is my least favorite opera, that one production of it remains memorable thanks to Treliński's genius.

In our interview that October of 2001, he told me (surprise, surprise) that the role of the opera director today is to make an old art form attractive to contemporary audiences, while retaining the original spirit of the work. He achieved that by making simple effects highly symbolic. Instead of recreating the early 20th century Nagasaki, he used lights to create images of shimmering water, boats silhouetted against the setting sun, the flow of Butterfly's blood. There were very few props. The stage was almost always bare, but never less than striking.

In a hitherto uncustomary prologue to the opening scene, three Polish mimes tiptoed over the dark and silent stage making grand theatrical movements at a slow pace as if performing some macabre dance. One of them slashed the air with a long knife. It was clear from their ominous expressions there will be no happy ending to the story.

The mimes reappeared throughout the opera in different roles - as servants, thieves, ghosts or spirits depicting Butterfly's moods - their movements and expressions reminiscent of the traditional Japanese kabuki theater. Similarly, Goro moved around the stage in bows and squats like an oversized sneaky cat with gestures and facial expressions that conveyed his shrewd and manipulative character better than words.

In the last highly symbolic scene the sky turned bright orange-red due to the eclipse of the sun. For Butterfly, the sun was gone with Pinkerton, said Treliński. "Butterfly sacrificed everything for the man she loved because she saw him as God. And that was her sin," he said. "Her excessive love for a man violated the first of the Ten Commandments."

The success of that production was such that Treliński got invited to return to Washington with his next creative endeavor, Andrea Chenier - also a very symbolic rendition, but in my view less focused and less memorable than his Butterfly. From the first act showing the nobility wrapped up in their cocoons (which I liked), the scene changed to something like an American country fair (which I didn't like), and the rest I forgot.

Treliński reappeared in the U.S. a few years later with productions of La Bohème and Don Giovanni that were not well received, and then I heard nothing of him, until he reappeared in New York in last season's spell-binding Met productions of Iolanta and Bluebird's Castle. The double bill performance made it crystal clear that during a decade and a half since his Butterfly in Washington, the Polish director had moved on. In his hands and Anna Netrebko's interpretation, the usually kitschy and pathetic princess Iolanta became a passionate young girl striving for independence and awareness. But it was in Bluebird's Castle, that Trelinski and his designer Boris Kudlička really outdid themselves. The double bill production was described as film noir, and seeing it in a movie theater as I did, was probably more impressive than seeing the live performance on account of the copious use of cinematic effects. Treliński believes that fairy tales always contain deeper levels and he is a master of unveiling them. He said he wanted the fairy-tale women to become real - the characters we can identify with. Both pieces were spectacularly successful, although for me Bluebird remains especially unique and unforgettable. It created a sense for the audience of being in a nightmare together with the performers. 

No wonder the Met snatched the talented Pole again for this season and this time with an offer he could not refuse. What can be more flattering for an opera director than an  invitation to present his vision of Tristan und Isolde and in no less than one of the world's top opera houses.

Photo: Ken Howard for the MetropolitanOpera

This time around the reviews were not unanimously complimentary. Some critics thought the modern warship setting and various video projections were unnecessary and distracting. One reviewer particularly hated references to Tristan's early loss of parents. None of this bothered me. I found Trelinski's contemporary setting as acceptable as any, and in an opera without too much action, an occasional appearance of Tristan's father's ghost, or some image from his childhood did not take away anything from the beauty of the music or from the central theme. The military costumes were not a novelty either. In fact, I was surprised to find this production of Wagner's work a lot less revolutionary than expected from such an innovator as Trelinski.

Still, his interpretation did reveal at least one new layer of Tristan for me. While for years I watched the opera as a great love story, this Saturday at a movie theater I saw it for the first time as an opera about death. Partly, it must have been due to the dark setting which highlighted all the talk about hating daylight and embracing night, and seeking relief in the blackness of the netherworld. But I am sure the shift in my perception was a great deal due to the protagonists who in this performance were anything but lovers. I have never been Nina Stemme's fan and no amount of imagination or goodwill on my part could turn Stuart Skelton into Tristan. To make matters worse, there was zero chemistry between the two. The only interpreters worth sitting through four hours of this opera were Ekaterina Gubanova, a convincing and lovable Brangäne - the best I've ever seen - and René Pape as dignified King Marke. Gubanova also never looked better. Neil Cooper's Melot was noteworthy, although less so.

Tristan und Isolde may be about death, but it is still primarily about star-crossed lovers - definitely not about their companions and relatives, and so despite Trelinski's effort and overall decent singing, this production fell flat.