Bluebeard’s Castle & A Room of One’s Own
Béla Bartók & Outi Tarkiainen
“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction,” Virginia Woolf claimed in her classic work A Room of One’s Own in 1929.
Based on Woolf’s text, the essay-like A Room of One’s Own is a women’s opera about women. It explores the female role in society, questioning why women have been overshadowed by men. Judith Shakespeare, the invented sister of the famous playwright, is just as talented and hard-working as William, but she has no career prospects because of her gender.
The mystic ambiance begins in the evening’s first chamber opera. Bluebeard’s Castle is a dreamlike psychological drama, to which the Hungarian language gives added vivacity of sound.
The orchestra weaves the fabric of the thriller. Only two characters are seen onstage: the duke and the enamoured Judith, who despite being told not to, opens one locked door after another. These doors lead to the duke’s secrets, and his tormented soul.
